Can I have Quicken clear and replace account data from bank?

lesmikesell

One Chase credit card account is showing a large positive balance when it should be a small negative amount, even though I have it set to reconcile with the online amount; Is there a way to tell quicken to dump all of its old transactions for an account and reload to match the institutions data? Or anything easier than deleting everything from the institution and adding all the details and settings back?

Tom Young

You can very easily clear every single transaction in a credit card register.  Simply select the first transaction in the register, scroll to the bottom of the register and use the Windows convention of holding down the Shift key while selecting the last transaction.  Every transaction between the first and last transaction will be selected.  Then right click the mouse and delete all of them.

But, you're not going to be able to simply ask Quicken to "reload" all the transaction in that Account.  Quicken "remembers" transactions that have been downloaded previously in that Account and isn't going to download them again.  Too, the financial institution associated with that Account limits how far back in time it will make downloaded transactions available - 90 days is common - so even if you could "reload" transactions the chances are that you're not going to get transactions all the way back to when you created the Account in Quicken.

Even if you could reload, why would you?  An Account is a lot more than a simple running total of the balance in the Account, it also has classified every single transaction using the Categories you've selected and unless you have a prodigious memory you're not going to be properly classify every single transaction - maybe stretching back for years - so that data will be lost.

The point is that Quicken doesn't "do your accounting for you", it helps "you do your accounting."  So I'd suggest that you at least attempt to figure out why the current balance in the Account is out of whack.  One not-infrequent source of incorrect current balances figures is that Quicken has been known to change the opening balance of an Account.  So that's the first place I'd look. 

If it's not an "opening balance" problem then another source of error is if a transaction or transactions in the past have, somehow, been altered or deleted, maybe by accident.  By running your eye back through the history of transactions in the register you probably can spot when the balance shown is obviously wrong, and then researching what caused that.  Backups are your friends here in when trying to determine transaction-level problems.

Tom Young

You can very easily clear every single transaction in a credit card register.  Simply select the first transaction in the register, scroll to the bottom of the register and use the Windows convention of holding down the Shift key while selecting the last transaction.  Every transaction between the first and last transaction will be selected.  Then right click the mouse and delete all of them.

But, you're not going to be able to simply ask Quicken to "reload" all the transaction in that Account.  Quicken "remembers" transactions that have been downloaded previously in that Account and isn't going to download them again.  Too, the financial institution associated with that Account limits how far back in time it will make downloaded transactions available - 90 days is common - so even if you could "reload" transactions the chances are that you're not going to get transactions all the way back to when you created the Account in Quicken.

Even if you could reload, why would you?  An Account is a lot more than a simple running total of the balance in the Account, it also has classified every single transaction using the Categories you've selected and unless you have a prodigious memory you're not going to be properly classify every single transaction - maybe stretching back for years - so that data will be lost.

The point is that Quicken doesn't "do your accounting for you", it helps "you do your accounting."  So I'd suggest that you at least attempt to figure out why the current balance in the Account is out of whack.  One not-infrequent source of incorrect current balances figures is that Quicken has been known to change the opening balance of an Account.  So that's the first place I'd look. 

If it's not an "opening balance" problem then another source of error is if a transaction or transactions in the past have, somehow, been altered or deleted, maybe by accident.  By running your eye back through the history of transactions in the register you probably can spot when the balance shown is obviously wrong, and then researching what caused that.  Backups are your friends here in when trying to determine transaction-level problems.

lesmikesell

Thanks, but the reason I use Quicken is to keep a current running balance across accounts at several financial institutions. I don't really care about old transactions because the financial institution's version is going to be the authority anyway, particularly on credit card purchases and payments. I've made no changes in the accounts and now I see that that the checking and savings accounts from that Chase account are also off. I guess I'll delete the institution completely and start over if there is no way to make quicken correct its mistakes.

Tom Young

"I guess I'll delete the institution completely and start over if there is no way to make quicken correct its mistakes. "

I don't know and you don't know if this is Quicken's mistake, Chase's mistake, or your mistake.  If all you're doing is keeping track of running balances then eye-balling the "online balance" (assuming it's correct, and sometimes it's not) down at the bottom of the register will give you that number.

lesmikesell

Thanks. As for being my mistake or Quicken's, all I have done is connect the accounts with the institutions and subsequently clicked the update icon over some time. I did see that it has the correct balance from the institution at the bottom even though its own total is wrong. Is there any way to get it to put that correct amount over in that left column where it shows the running net worth total? That is the thing I want to be right. If I ever need to look at transactions, I'll have to work with the institution's copy anyway.

Tom Young

Simply make an adjusting entry transaction - sounds like you need a "payment" - that gets the balance correct.  Use the Account Name itself in square brackets as the "Category."  [Name of Chase CC Account]

That will get the current balance correctly stated and not affect anything else in you file.

lesmikesell

Thanks - I guess I can do a one-time adjustment and see if it stays in sync, but I'm beginning to think that quicken is the wrong tool for what I need. Do you know if there is any other software that will collate data from several institutions and account types to show current balances in a single update? I'd prefer it to run on my own PC instead of online, though. I'm really just monitoring for unexpected changes and watching overall status.

q_lurker

@lesmikesell. Did you look at the opening balance transaction for the account?  That transaction value has gotten damaged for some users by some downloads. I try to have mine set at $0. Some use the memo field of that transaction to track the correct value.