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How to schedule recurring autopay transactions

shelquis

I recently set up autopay for all my monthly bill payments. Up til now, I've always written monthly checks and recorded the payment in my Checking account register, Now, on the bill due date, each biller is authorized to access my Checking account and withdraw a payment for the amount of the bill. These are primarily utility, credit card and insurance bills.

I havent been able to figure out how to create a scheduled recurring transaction, to appear in my Checking account register. This scheduled transaction would then match when the actual transaction downloads from my Checking account, Would appreciate your help setting this up. Thanks.

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Snorkle

I have a number of reminders that are linked to online billers. You can do this by creating a reminder or editing an existing reminder and selecting the option to link it to a biller. Alternatively I believe you can add an online bill in the bills and income section and that will create a corresponding reminder. After having done this I am not sure how valuable this is. Not all of my billers are supported in Quicken. Bills are not reliably downloaded in Quicken. Most of the time I get an email from the biller before the bill shows up in Quicken. Two factor authorization for the biller login is also a nuisance. But when it works it is a nice feature.

shelquis

Hi @Snorkle. I don't need or want a reminder, I just want the autopay to match with a transaction in my Checking register when it's downloaded from the bank. I don't get online bills for any of thse, i just get an email advising me that such and such an amount will be deducted from my Checking account on some date.

An option (that I;m trying to improve on) would be to manually enter a checking transaction when I get that email. But I'd rather automate the transaction creation than to type it in every month.

UKR

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20343996#Comment_20343996

In the past you used scheduled reminders to write and mail a check every month.
Now, with Autopay by the biller active, you should use a similar “Manual Bill” reminder to record the bill into your Quicken register when you receive notification of a new bill being available.
When you download transactions from the bank containing the Autopay debit, Quicken will match the download to the already existing register transaction. That'll be the same procedure as before, where you had written a check.

shelquis

Well, I'd never heard of a Manual Bill before, but it sounds like I'll still need to manually enter a transaction each month. I was hoping to eliminate that manual input. But if this is the best I can do, I can live with it. Just seems like there ought to be some way to automate that step. How does a Manual Reminder help me compared to just entering a transaction when I get the email of Balance Due each month?

Rocket J Squirrel

You do not need to manually enter recurring transactions. Quicken's use of the word “reminder” is confusing. What are now called Reminders were formerly called Scheduled Transactions, which is a more accurate name.

The word “manual” in “manual bill" is also confusing. In this case “manual” means you enter the bill - once - using your hands rather than having it come down the wire via online billing.

So create a manual bill reminder and set it to auto enter. See the highlighted area of the dialog below.

shelquis

Hey @Rocket J Squirrel, thanks for the elaboration. It sonds like the Manual Reminder is indeed the solution I was looking for. Silly me, I just thought it would be called a scheduled transaction😂. Give me a hint on how to create the manual bill reminder and I'll give it a try.

Rocket J Squirrel

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20344078#Comment_20344078

You want a hint? OK. First, go to the View menu and Select Classic Menus. The “Standard” menu setting hides some menus and replaces them with “tabs”. With Classic menus, you can hide the now-redundant and space-wasting tabs. (My humble opinion.)

Now that you have all the menus visible, explore them. That's your hint. Look for “Manage Bill & Income Reminders". It should be in one of the first few menus, hint hint. (Or your fingers might slip and hit CTRL-J.) From there, you can add your scheduled transactions.

shelquis

OK, thanks @Rocket J Squirrel. I'll try to do that tomorrow. I hope this process, once set up, will be as smooth and easy as i've imagined it to be. I'll let you know what happens when I try to set up the Manual Bill Reminders. Thanks for your help.

jrich75

Just so it's clear, you will still need to make some “adjustments” if the payment amount changes frequently. Quicken does not know the amount of the revised payment amount unless you tell it. You can set the auto entry amount to the same as the last payment, the average of a number of payments or a fixed amount but for volume based utility bills (gas, water or electricity) that will probably not match the new bill if there is any change in usage.

shelquis

Hi @jrich75. Thanks, I was wondering about that, but I ended up deciding it didn't matter because I'd get get a Near Match upon download of the actual bank payment, and I'd just accept the download payment. Is that correct? What if I just put in a Zero amount when I create the manual bill reminder?

Snorkle

If you setup an online bill then you will have a reminder that has a link to the biller as shown in the attachment. Then the actual amount for each month's bill is downloaded automatically into Quicken and the bill can be entered. When this feature works it is very convenient, but as I indicated in my earlier post there are some issues. For most of my billers a copy of the actual bill is also downloaded.

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Screenshot 2023-03-06 080720.png

Snorkle

I probably should have mentioned that the use of an online bill does not require the use of Quicken Bill Manager.

shelquis

Hi @Snorkle. Thanks. Can I have both a manual bill reminder and an on-line bill reminder? Or, do I need to delete (somehow) the manual bill reminder prevously established. It looks like I delete an established manual bill reminder on the edit screen for that reminder. Correct?

Snorkle

@shelquis In fact when I set up my online bills I edited manual reminders to create the online bill by clicking on "Link it Now." I have attached one of my manual bills/reminders that shows what to select. I think that by linking to a biller from an existing reminder you will end up with an online bill with the corresponding reminder. Keep in mind that not all billers are setup in Quicken for this feature.

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shelquis

Thanks @Snorkle.

Snorkle

@shelquis Just yesterday I received email from my water utility that a new bill was available and today the bill was downloaded into Quicken. Hope you are able to take advantage of the online bill.

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shelquis

Thanks @Snorkle. Yeah, I look forward to trying it. Out of an abundance of caution, I'm going to stick with the manual bill setup I have right now until the first cycle is complete. Then if everything goes the way I'm expecting it to go, then I'll add the online link like you suggested. Appreciate your help.