Categorizing of transfers between banking accounts

thomastwosome

** I've used Quicken in the past and don't remember having this situation.

I just connected to my Bank for the first time and pulled down transactions for Checking, Savings and Visa. When I look at my Savings register I see incoming transfers from my checking account and they are categorized as [Savings]. My gut tells me this should say [Checking] but what do I know. So I go to rename one of these transactions, upon saving, I get the message "You are recording a transfer back into the same account. Save it anyway?" That leads me to believe that I am correct and that the category *should* be [Checking]. So I update it to [Checking], save without an error message and when I switch to my Checking register I see there is a new 'Uncleared' entry (basically a duplicate).

Before I go too far down the rabbit hole ... what am I doing wrong. I remember it being much easier than this in the past.

Thanks in advance!

Tom Young

"When I look at my Savings register I see incoming transfers from my checking account and they are categorized as [Savings]. My gut tells me this should say [Checking] but what do I know."

Both a transfer from checking (a "Deposit" in savings) and a transfer to checking (a "Payment" in savings) should have [Checking] in the Category box.  Looking in the checking register the "other leg" of any transfer, to or from savings, should have [Savings] in the Category box.  Go over to the checking Account and look at the "other leg" of several transaction.  Do they show up in the same fashion, showing [Checking] in the Category boxes?

"So I go to rename one of these transactions, upon saving, I get the message "You are recording a transfer back into the same account. Save it anyway?" That leads me to believe that I am correct and that the category *should* be [Checking]."

Well, you're correct in your belief, but you should not be seeing that message.  That message "you are recording a transfer back into the same account" means exactly that, but by changing the Category to [Checking] you're not doing what the warning is telling you that you're doing; you're trying to record it (the transfer) into a different Account.

"So I update it to [Checking], save without an error message and when I switch to my Checking register I see there is a new 'Uncleared' entry (basically a duplicate)."

That's pretty much what I'd expect. 

Can you post an entry or two of what you're seeing here?  That is both the "from" and "to" entries (before you change them) that show these transfers?  What you're describing shouldn't be happening.

thomastwosome

Here is a line item from my Checking register showing a transfer (payment) to Savings: picture named Checking.png

Followed by the corresponding line item from my Savings register showing a transfer (deposit) from Checking: picture named Savings.png

Checking2.png shows when I renamed the Payee to 'Transfer', but didn't touch the Category. Upon saving the line I receive the warning in Warning.png.

Still in my Checking register, if I then try to update the category to [Savings], upon saving I do not get a warning, but now I have an extra/duplicate entry in my Savings register. See Savings2.png.

UKR

Please ensure that all optional settings in Quicken pertaining to recall, memorization, automatic categorization and renaming of payee names are enabled. You find those settings in Edit / Preferences / Data Entry & Quickfill and Downloaded Transactions. Additional settings for the detection and processing of transfer transactions can be found in Edit / Preferences / Transfer detection.

If I understand you correctly, you let the download process create transactions in both accounts.
For manually created transfers, Quicken usually creates a linked pair of transactions, one in Checking, linked to its counterpart in Savings. Change or delete one and its linked other half will disappear.

To fix your situation, do this:

• In Checking, change the Payee to "Transfer to Savings" and the category to [Savings], to create a proper linked transfer transaction.
  
• Go into Savings and delete the now duplicate downloaded transaction with the different Payee Name, categorized to [Savings].
• In Savings, leave the one named "Transfer to Savings", now categorized to [Checking] unchanged. That's the other half of the transdaction in Checking.

For future transfer transactions, for best results, manually enter transfer transactions into your register BEFORE you download transactions from the bank which contain the transfer confirmations. For recurring transfers use scheduled reminders and enter them a day or two before the due date.  (This also includes Cash Withdrawals if you record them as transfers from Checking to a Cash account register)
Be sure to use distinct Payee Names for each transfer / credit card payment to avoid confusing Quicken - memorized payee entries.
That takes the guesswork out of the download process. Because a correctly entered transfer transaction already exists in your account registers, the download process should just match the downloaded transfer transaction to the existing one and do so correctly in both accounts.