If I transfer from one account to another quicken gets confused

T.Day

If I transfer from one account to another quicken gets confused when downloading transactions . Quicken Starter

Boatnmaniac

Please provide more detail about what "confused" means.

Chris_QPW

Quicken doesn't have the information to definitively determine if a given transaction is a transfer to another account.

There is this preference:
Edit -> Preferences -> Transfer detection -> Scan downloaded transactions for possible transfers

What this is doing is just looking for two transactions in two accounts one a deposit and the other a withdraw for the same amount on about the same day and guessing that they might be a transfer.

This is only a guess and can certainly be wrong for transactions where the amount is "commonly used" like $100.  That is why is super important that if you have this preference on, you also have the confirm preference on and make sure these are really a transfer when requested.

The better policy though is to pre-enter transfers before they are downloaded so that Quicken will just match to that transfer instead of having to guess at it.

T.Day

That sounds like exactly whats happening. I'm going to try your suggestion of turning on "confirm preference" What would happen if I turn off "scan downloaded transactions" ?

T.Day

> @Boatnmaniac said:
> Please provide more detail about what "confused" means.

Sure, I realize my question is a little vague .So here goes. When I transfer money from MY Checking to my Daughters checking, Quicken will sometimes show it in my account but not Hers, or the other way around. Also once on the same day I made two $20 transfers to Her account and Quicken erased one of them. Another time I received a Zelle deposit from a friend and then I transferred it into my savings. Quicken erased the deposit but kept the transfer. I thought it might be the renaming rules but I deleted most of the rules and it keeps happening .

Chris_QPW

T.Day said:

That sounds like exactly whats happening. I'm going to try your suggestion of turning on "confirm preference" What would happen if I turn off "scan downloaded transactions" ?

If all you do is turn off “scan downloaded transactions” Quicken won’t try to guess what are transfers and try to connect them, so you will end up with a deposit in one account and a withdraw in the other that aren’t “linked”.

What categories they get is really determined by “timing” and what you do with the categories.

There is actually a few possibilities.

1. You pre-enter the transfer (maybe using a reminder), and as such both of the downloaded transactions get matched to that transaction.
2. This one is going to really depend on the timing.  Say this is a credit card payment.  In that case it is unlikely to appear in both accounts at the same time.  So, say I download the payment in the credit card, and I set the category to [Checking Account].  That will create a linked transfer transaction in the checking account.  And then when it downloads the payment in the checking account Quicken would just match that transfer.  If both of these transactions downloaded at the same time there will be a problem.  You will already have a transaction in both accounts and if you set the category in one of them to [Other account] that will create another “linked transfer” transaction in the the other account duplicating the one that is already there.
3. If one didn’t care about linked transfers they could use any regular category they liked on both transactions.  This would would be correct “double book accounting wise” where the deposit offsets the withdrawal in the other account. But it isn’t what most Quicken users would expect, as a “transfer”.