Anyone to explain how best to use: TAGS-NOTES-MEMOS

Tegiro

I'm new to Quicken and when using my register, I find these 3 columns available but would like a bit more explanation as to the best way to use them. I have Categories fine-tuned but these 3 other columns need more explanation for me if I'm to use them with Categories. Can anyone offer me some written explanations (manual?) or even a video?
Thank you

volvogirl

For Tags......There are Categories and Sub-Categories and Tags. You use a colon in front of a sub-category.  The forward slash / designates a Tag  or there is also a TAG column.  

Example of Sub-Category….

Auto:Auto Fuel

Auto:Maintance

Example of Tags…

Auto Fuel/Toyota

Auto Fuel/Ford

I have a home business and use Tags for each job.  Then when I run a report I can sort it by job.  So an expense entry might look like this…

Business Expense:Supplies/Maple Street

Chris_QPW

You didn't mention which three columns you are talking about.
I guess the presumption is category, memo, and tag (note there are others that can be turned on/off with this icon in the register: 

Category you got.  Memo, just some note to yourself about this transaction.
@volvogirl already mentioned a use case for tags, but I will state what is different about them than categories.

First off categories can have subcategories, tags can't, they are all at the same level even if multiple tags are applied to the same transaction.  For instance, if you pull up a report filter to TagA that will give you every transaction that has TagA on it even if that transaction has other tags on it like TagA:TagB...

Next, I view the main reason for tags is to avoid having to create duplicate categories.
You could have categories like this:

Vacation A:Dining
Vacation A:Hotel
Vacation B:Dining
Vacation B:Hotel

Needless to say, this would give you a lot of possible duplicate categories.  Tags allow you to reuse the same categories and still keep them separate when you do things like run a report.

Tom Young

Basically the process of "accounting" amounts to "earmarking" (identifying) transactions in a way that is useful to you.  Categories are the fundamental method of earmarking transactions.

Accordingly, we create income and expense Categories, or use Quicken's set of built-in Categories, to identify the nature of our incomes and expenses.  Quicken comes with a pretty comprehensive set of Categories built-in and you're free to use those Categories, not use those Categories, and create your own Categories.   

In Quicken, Categories can have SubCategories and SubSubCategories and so on, (I'm not sure how deep the nesting goes), to create distinctions that we want to see in our reports.  So an income Category like Social Security might have a couple of logical SubCategories like "Spouse1" and "Spouse 2", allowing you know how much each spouse is receiving in Social Security, as well as the total amount for the two.  Or your Clothes expense Category might have SubCategories of Spouse 1, Spouse 2, Kid 1, Kid 2, if you wanted to track Clothes expenses more closely that one big Category of "Clothes."

Categories and SubCategories are well-controlled by Quicken.  To create a SubCategory you have to tie it to the Category above it, so, going back to the two Categories above, you're not going to accidentally enter a transaction of Social Security:Kid 1.

Tags are a secondary method of earmarking transactions, kind of like a Category, but not nearly as well controlled.  Tags are "free floating" in that Quicken doesn't care if you attach a particular Tag to a transaction to which it doesn't apply e.g., you apply a Tag of "Anniversary", created to track your 25th anniversary expenses, to the Social Security Category, or forget to apply a Tag to a transaction that should really have one.   I think Tags are best used for "one-time" events, like that Anniversary Tag which you might use with a bunch of different expense Categories associated with the occasion, or with infrequent transactions where you want to make a distinction but don't want to end up with a Category that has 27 different SubCategories attached to it.

While you can run reports that look at the Memo field, I don't really think of that field as an "earmarking" field, because it's a "free verse" field where you can enter something, or nothing.  I generally use the Memo to identify the particulars of a transaction when doing historical research. 

Tegiro

To volvogirl, Chris_QPW and Tom Young,
Thank you all for your response to my query. They all had excellent answers to my question. I will now experiment with your suggested ideas and hope I can use them to my advantage in reports etc.
Again, thank you for your help.
Tegiro