Can Not Add Expense Subcategory

Clay Moody

I am trying to add a new subcategory under my Auto and Transport category to track expenses for each of my vehicles. Come to find out, when I click on New Category> Subcategory Of, I can only add subcategories of Income type categories, such as net salary, employer benefits, etc. None of my expense categories show up in the drop-down menu.

This has not been an issue for me in the past. I have added several expense type subcategories that show up in the categories list as expenses when I check there. I have tried repairing and validating my file and restarting the program, but no luck. Anyone else having or has had this issue?

tisacson

I have the same problem and also tried the repair with no improvement. I opened a different Quicken data file and the subcategory was able to be added as normal so the problem is with my primary data file and validate does not fix it. Any suggestions?

wmorgan999

Same Here - lots of issues with latest release - cannot Update categories from Reports now either

wmorgan999

contacted support - had them replicate the issue via the screen - gave me a ticket# to call back to escalate

fredact

Exact same issue. Cannot add a subcategory to an expense.

phillipdhall

+1 All I wanted to do was update the tax relationship of a category, and it forced me to make it no longer a subcategory of my expense. Seems like an oops in latest release.

EdandPeg

Same issue since the latest update. Using R47.11 Build 27.1.47.11. I'm sure they are aware and a fix will be made the next time you do One Step Update or restart the program. Just a pain for now.

Quicken Jasmine

Hello All,

Thank you for taking the time to visit the Community to report this issue, though we apologize that you are experiencing this.

We have forwarded this issue to the proper channels to have this further investigated. In the meantime, we request that you please navigate to Help > Report a problem and submit a problem report with log files attached in order to contribute to the investigation.

While you will not receive a response through this submission, these reports will help our teams further investigate the issue. The more problem reports we receive, the better.

We apologize for any inconvenience! Thank you.

Gershon Shamay

I tried several data file backups, found one (from ~3 weeks ago) where I could add a subcategory as expected. Closed the file, opened it again and ran Validate right away. When it finished, I could not add a subcategory anymore. Note to Quicken developers: wherever the bug is, it appears the Validate process triggers some change in the internal data, revealing the bug.
Also - question to the forum: how can I revert to a previous Quicken release? It was working just fine for me.

dbb_bissell

I see the problem. One should go to his or her list of categories and browse through the first several of the expnse categories. Do you see, when doing that, an odd looking category? One that you didn't create and have never used? If so, delete that category and all of the following categories should be available in your drop down list when you create a new subcategory. This, at any rate, worked for me.

Gershon Shamay

Wonderful find by dbb_bissell. Deleting that weird /zombie category fixed the problem for me as well.

fredact

> @dbb_bissell said:
> I see the problem. One should go to his or her list of categories and browse through the first several of the expnse categories. Do you see, when doing that, an odd looking category? One that you didn't create and have never used? If so, delete that category and all of the following categories should be available in your drop down list when you create a new subcategory. This, at any rate, worked for me.

Thanks so much!!! This did the trick.

Sammy A

Thanks @dbb_bissell !!! It worked for me too.

The "zombie" expense category in my database was ACCT_3bc3, very weird!!! I never created and didn't have any description. As soon as I deleted it I was able to add subcategories for expenses.

*** ATTN Developers *** I hope this bit of information helps find the root cause of this bug.

Quicken Janean

Hi All, I have shared this find and fix with our team. Thanks for reporting this. 

-Quicken Janean

mshiggins

It's possible there is a way around the problem, but since none of my Quicken files has the problem, I can't verify whether this will work.

In the Category List, right-click the category you want to create a sub-category for. 

In the resulting dropdown menu, select "New subcategory". The "New Category" dialog will open with the parent-category-to-be already selected in the "Subcategory of" dropdown. Then you can just enter the name of the new sub-category in the Category Name field and click OK.

-JP

Andrew Z

> @Quicken Janean said:
> Hi All, I have shared this find and fix with our team. Thanks for reporting this. 
>
> -Quicken Janean

Quicken Janean - when will this issue be fixed? I am having the same problem.

UKR

Andrew Z said:

...
Quicken Janean - when will this issue be fixed? I am having the same problem.

In your other discussion I saw mention of an account named something like ACCT_xxxx

Does this ghost account appear as a category in your Tools / Category List(*)? If so, try deleting it.

Worst case, you may have to restore your Quicken data file from a backup taken prior to running the latest Validate where the ACCT_xxxx was mentioned.

(*) Make sure the Category List is set to "Show Full List" and "[x] Show hidden categories" and sorted by category.

djhc12a

After I performed a validate on Feb 8, I noticed the strange category that used to be an old account in the category list.

Today, I noticed I was unable to add a subcategory under any of my personal expenses. I used the recommendation above in deleting the category that use to be an account. I was able to get a partial list of expenses. I noted what was the last category in the list displayed. I opened my personal expenses under the category list and marked "Show hidden categories" I scrolled to the last category I noted above, checked the next category, and noticed another account (currently active) showing up as a category. I deleted it. I was able to see all the income and expense subcategories.

I performed another validate file to see if I got any more issues. I checked the data_log.txt file. It indicated that the QEL: The old file was corrupt and only some of the data has been recovered.

I checked old_logs.txt to see what the log file indicated on Feb 8th. QDF: Repaired an account not mentioned above. It also indicated that an "Invalid category type corrected."

I decided to restore to a previous backup. I actually did several until I knew I had a proper validate on 12/31/2022. For each restore I would check the categories to make sure that I did not see the bogus categories, then I would do a validate function, and finally I would check to see if the bogus categories reoccurred. In each case, they did. I checked the log files, the QDF log file indicated a problem with the account mentioned above and no action required (no other info provided), QEL indicated no read errors and all internal consistency checks passed, but nothing to indicate the addition of these bogus categories.

I decided to restore to my last backup prior to Feb 8th (last validate) and take my chances that this issue will be resolved without my having to restore to last year's backups. I plan NOT to perform "Validate File" until this issue is resolved.

zeeeter

Deleting three ACCT_*** categories allowed me to create an expense subcategory - thanks for the suggestion. Solved my issue.

prrite

"dbb_bissell" nailed it. Find the "ACCT_###", delete it and income sub-categories reappear. Thank you!

Steven

Copied from another thread for visibility:

FWIW, in my case the bogus category was not ACCT_####, it was a category with the same name as an existing, valid account.

For me the corruption started mid-January though I didn't detect it until February.

I am able to reproduce the problem by going back to the undamaged files from that day and running validate. The validate report said it corrected a damaged category and (apparently) damaged the file. After that validate, the category list was broken.

It looks like the dialog drop downs will tell you where to look for the bogus category: the last category in the dropdown is (probably?) the category right before the damaged category in the category list (ignoring accounts).

I pretty much a super validate every day. I learned that from the "Corrected 1 Bought or Shares Added transaction that was incorrectly categorized as a realized gain." fiasco which Quicken has never fixed (but isn't causing me any big problems). But I didn't notice the one very short line in the repair back in January. I guess I'll have to be doubly careful. Sigh.

rpgarrett75703

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20339453#Comment_20339453

That didn't work for me. When I tried to create the subcategory the parent category was blank in the “Subcategory of” drop down. I didn't notice any odd looking categories in the list. So not knowing what categories could have been bad I tried deleting all of the unused categories except for any category beginning with an underscore “_” and any category that was assigned to a tax line item. I figured I could always recreate categories as needed. Anyway, that seemed to fix things for me. I can know create subcategories. Previously, when I tried to create the subcategory the parent category was blank in the “Subcategory of” drop down. When I clicked on the drop down only a partial list of categories got displayed. After deleting those unused categories when I click on the drop down all the missing categories appeared.

Smokey7422

> @UKR said:
> In your other discussion I saw mention of an account named something like ACCT_xxxx
> Does this ghost account appear as a category in your Tools / Category List(*)? If so, try deleting it.Worst case, you may have to restore your Quicken data file from a backup taken prior to running the latest Validate where the ACCT_xxxx was mentioned.
> (*) Make sure the Category List is set to "Show Full List" and "[x] Show hidden categories" and sorted by category.

Just deleting that weird ACCT_xxxx category did the trick for me.

HankHH

Thanks, all! I was having the same issue. Found the ACCT _xxx category easily; deleted it and can now again create expense subcategories.

Quicken Janean

Hi All, We shared the fix with our team, however we still need more details. If you have not already, please go to Help> Report a Problem and upload screenshots and sanitized logs. Our development team appreciates any feedback you can share. Thanks!

-Quicken Janean

Quicknator

> @dbb_bissell said:
> I see the problem. One should go to his or her list of categories and browse through the first several of the expnse categories. Do you see, when doing that, an odd looking category? One that you didn't create and have never used? If so, delete that category and all of the following categories should be available in your drop down list when you create a new subcategory. This, at any rate, worked for me.

THANK YOU! Great catch! I had the same issue, found bogus "ACCT_334a" that I did not create, with no subcategories or transactions, at top of expense category list. I deleted it, now I can create expense subcategories.

I have latest Quicken updates and occasionally validate/super-validate files, so I hope it doesn't re-appear. Unfortunately, before finding this fix, while attempting to repair the category, I created a new top-level category of the same name since Q would not allow it to be a subcategory of an existing top-level expense category, so I now had 2 categories with the same name, one being the original subcategory, the other being the new top-level one with the same name. When I deleted the new top-level category, I lost all my prior categorizations with the same name (both the new top-level and the old subcategory of a different top-level category), so I may have to restore from backup to get it back.

In addition, I just now noticed I can no longer view category transactions or run reports from the category manager by right-clicking the category as we were able prior to the "updates" so I can check my work. That sucks! Now I have to create an new category report to see my transactions? Come on, man!

Viking64

Thank you @dbb_bissell for your research to have found this bug. I, too, found the first category in my list to be a bogus one that I never created. Since I never looked before, I have no idea if it was there before I had the problem or when it may have appeared in terms of version updates and no idea of how a bogus new category would have appeared in some way linked to an update unless there is a gremlin at work at Quicken. My bogus category was named" ACCT-10b8d. I deleted it and then the full list of Top-level categories appeared in the dropdown list for creation of Subcategories.

I re-added that category to my category list so that I would have a screenshot with it present. Just to see what might happen, I then tried creating a Subcategory with the bogus category back in the list. The drop down list now had the full array of Top-level categories. This suggests that there must have been some additional code attached to this category listing that was creating the problem. The text of my bogus category and that posted by Quicknator and others has the air of a code notation that might have not been properly "surrounded" to isolate it.

RE: the suggestion/request of Quicken Janean and Quicken Jasmine to share this with Quicken through the Help>Report a Problem method, I had done so prior to having descended this thread far enough to have found the solution. I am going to repost a Help>Report problem now with the bogus account replaced, but with the program now allowing me to create new categories.

By the way, as I am also, since an update some time in the Fall of 2022, unable to change Tags from Register Reports or other reports with individual transactions (despite several hrs with customer service and their agent reproducing the problem on his version of Quicken with his data and with a test data file), I went to my Tags List and found several bogus tags that I had not created. Removing them did not resolve that problem. I see from the forum that others have the same issue. These bogus tags also had the appearance of code string pieces. Is seems there may be something not cool happening in the diligence of the coding team's verification process.

One problem resolved.