Why am I suddenly having monthly reconciliation inaccuracies? (Q Mac)

UniqueHorizon

I've used Quicken for years. I reconcile one account manually, and only this year (starting in February 2022) have I been encountering the following issue. The first time, my starting balance on my bank statement matched the prior ending balance on both the prior bank statement and in Quicken. However, at the end of reconciling (and I double, triple, quadruple checked all of the entry values), Quicken insisted that the account didn't balance, despite the fact that both Quicken and the bank statement agreed on the exact totals of deposits and withdrawals cleared. In other words, there were no extra or missing entries in Quicken compared to the bank statement, and all of the numerical values for all of the transactions were identical.

So, that month, for the first time, I used an adjustment entry to complete the reconciliation. I note here that the adjustment necessary (an extra withdrawal of $39.40) did not match any other entries in my Quicken ledger or on the bank statement (i.e. it wasn't that I had accidentally duplicated or omitted a transaction).

The following month, I had the same problem: although the Quicken and bank statements had no discrepancies, at the end, my Cleared entries didn't balance with my bank statement. So, I grudgingly had Quicken create a new adjustment. And, this time, it was for a deposit of $39.40 (the opposite from the month prior). Thus, once again, after two months, my account was balanced.

At this point, I thought this was just a one-time fluke issue. But in the third month, the same thing happened again, and the automatic adjustment that time was -$24.04. The following month, the same thing: an adjustment of -$6.87 was necessary. Then, the fifth month, the required adjustment was +$30.91 (which perfectly compensated for the combined adjustment the two months prior of -$30.91).

At this point, I'm not sure what to make of this pattern. Any thoughts? Every month, I have verified that my Quicken entries and bank statement have no duplicated or missing entries, and there are no mistakes in the amounts of those entries. The problem is continuing to date.

The only thing I can think of is the possibility that the dates I record transactions in Quicken aren't necessarily the same dates that those transactions clear in my account. Thus, my monthly bank statements should not perfectly align (by date) with my Quicken ledger in terms of the transactions at the start and the end of each statement period. However, this cannot explain the problem, because this would have always been an issue (for every user). I've used Quicken for years, and I have only been experiencing this problem this year (2022).

Any advice on how to solve this problem? Did Quicken earlier this year change something in the simple math it performs during reconciliation? I can't imagine that the simple mathematical rules of additional and subtraction rules changed in 2022. This really has me stumped.

scottbateman89

I am having the same issue, though with different amounts. After several searches on the internet, a call in support hang up(they hung up on me and I hadnt even swore or seriously raised my voice), and now a chat session, I am getting seriously frustrated. The chat support told me to just change the opening balance. I asked "Every month?" That is a work around that seems to be trying to deny a likely bug in the software. I would also suggest you check balances throughout your history every so often. I swear mine have changed wihtout me adding or removing or changing any historical transactions. Periodic screenshots should do th trick. I have seen other posts that hint it could be in the one step update.

UniqueHorizon

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20348119#Comment_20348119

Thanks for posting - it is at least reassuring to know that I'm not alone in this, but it is bad to hear the way you have been treated by Quicken support! Hopefully the hang-up was just an accidental disconnect.

I'll add that the same problem has continued for me (it has been over a year now): every month since February 2022, I've had to add a reconciliation adjustment line in my ledger. Each month the amount is different and never matches the amount of any of my deposits or withdrawals, and every second or third month, the reconciliation adjustments cancel themselves out and I'm back to have the reconciliation process end with a balanced account. This has to be a software bug. Quicken are you listening; do you care?

Quicken Kristina

Hello @UniqueHorizon and @scottbateman89,

Thank you for reaching out to the Community and telling us about your issue.  I'm sorry to hear you're running into this problem. When you are doing the reconcile in Quicken, are you having it use the online balance, or are you using the statement balance? Was there anything that happened just before the issue started, such as a power outage, power surge, or the program unexpectedly closing? Do you keep your Quicken file on your hard drive, or is it on a shared drive or cloud drive (such as iCloud or Dropbox)?

Thank you.

UniqueHorizon

> @Quicken Kristina said:
> Hello @UniqueHorizon and @scottbateman89,
>
> Thank you for reaching out to the Community and telling us about your issue.  I'm sorry to hear you're running into this problem. When you are doing the reconcile in Quicken, are you having it use the online balance, or are you using the statement balance? Was there anything that happened just before the issue started, such as a power outage, power surge, or the program unexpectedly closing? Do you keep your Quicken file on your hard drive, or is it on a shared drive or cloud drive (such as iCloud or Dropbox)?
>
> Thank you.

Thanks for asking. I'm using the statement balance (I don't use any of the online features). As I wrote in the initial post, this has been a recurring issue on a monthly basis beginning months ago. Because so much time has passed, I can't be absolutely certain in responding to your second question, but I'm 99.9% sure that Quicken has not crashed on me (or had an issue during an update) prior to this issue beginning, and I have not had issues with power outages or surges. My Quicken files are local (on my hard drive).

Quicken Kristina

Thank you for your reply,

Due to the nature of this issue, it is recommended that you contact Quicken Support directly for further assistance as they can walk you through troubleshooting steps in real-time and escalate the situation as needed.  The Quicken Support phone number can be found through this link here. Phone support is available from 5:00 am PT to 5:00 pm PT, Monday through Friday.

I apologize that I could not be of more assistance!

bpandhbooks

I am also having this problem with reconciliation. My bank statement deposit and payment amounts exactly match the totals at the top of my reconciliation screen, yet Quicken insists that I have a balance difference and won't finish reconciling without adding an adjustment.

I have the latest version of Quicken Starter for Mac which has until now provided all the features I have needed.

bpandhbooks

Added info - I just now tried to add an adjustment and Quicken crashed on me. I'll be calling Tech Support on Monday morning.