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How can I make sure Quicken never initiates a bill payment? I only want to pay from my bank website.

cbowji

Hello, years ago I used the “online bill payment” system where when I entered a transaction in my Quicken register, Quicken would initiate a payment through my bank. Problems arose as I work with five banks, they all work differently, and the payments didn't go through smoothly. I switched to going to my bank's website to pay bills. Now I realize those payees are on the “online payee list.” It seems quicken keeps adding payees to the “online payee list.” But i never want to pay via Quicken again due to the many errors I experienced. How can I disconnect quicken's “online payee list” so it never works again? Also, if I delete the payees from quicken “online payee list,” will all the payee addresses etc be deleted from my Fifth Third Bank bill pay? Thank you

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Boatnmaniac

That is really odd. I've never heard of Quicken activating DC Bank Bill Pay without specific authorization by the user. Maybe someone else has heard of this issue and will pipe in here.

I know of no way to hide Online Payees. You could try to delete the Online Payees but make sure the applicable accounts have Bank Bill Pay deactivated before do that. If Bank Bill Pay is not deactivated then if you delete the Online Payees they will likely be repopulated, again, the next time you run OSU.

Boatnmaniac

BTW, banks cannot set up Bank Bill Pay in Quicken. It must be initiated by the Quicken user from within Quicken.

Also, if Bank Bill Pay is activated and if you delete an Online Payee for that bank in Quicken it will sometimes delete that Payee at the bank, as well. But, again, this requires Bank Bill Pay to be Active. If Bank Bill Pay is not active, then there is no information that is uploaded from Quicken to the bank so it will not delete the payee at the bank. You can confirm this by deleting 1-2 Online Payees in Quicken…after making sure that Bank Bill Pay is first deactivated.

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Boatnmaniac

Go to the Online Services tab of Account Details for each bank that you want to do this for.

If at the bottom of that tab you see the option to “Deactivate” Bank Bill Pay, click on it and the service will be deactivated.

If it does not show that “Deactivate” option then it means that Bank Bill Pay is already not set up for it.

Bank Bill Pay must be activated in order to send bill pay commands to the bank using Direct Connect.

Account Details_Online Bill Payent_Deactivate (2023-03-10).png

cbowji

Thank you for your answer. I had all my Quicken banks' “Bank Bill Pay” “Deactivated" (as you show above). A couple weeks ago, Fifth Third Bank had some ongoing downloading issues, and I “deactivated” my “online setup” (for downloading transactions). I did some manual downloads. Later I “reactivated” my “online setup” to download transactions. When I reconnected to my bank, the system AUTOMATICALLY switched “bank bill pay” to “activated.” I didn't notice it at first, and I made a bill payment thru my bank website, but also looks like quicken made on online payment. So two payments were withdrawn from my bank account. I only want to “download transactions” with my bank, no quicken bill pay. Also, what would happen if I deleted all “online Payees” in it's list? Would my bank keep connecting and add any vendors I pay online? If I delete online payees in the list, will they also be deleted from my bank's bill pay system? Somehow the bank and Quicken seem to have more connectivity than I realized. thanks

cbowji

If I could “hide” any “online payees” from the payee dropdown list in the register, then there would be less chance of double payment.

Boatnmaniac

That is really odd. I've never heard of Quicken activating DC Bank Bill Pay without specific authorization by the user. Maybe someone else has heard of this issue and will pipe in here.

cbowji

(Edited for readability.)

I think it was Fifth Third Bank that reactivated my quicken “online payees. I don't think Quicken did it. Maybe the bank activated it by default. Somehow there is a strong connectivity between Fifth Third Bank and Quicken. That is fine for transaction downloads, but not for quicken online billpay.

Thanks for the info about Online Payee list in Quicken repopulation. Maybe the connectivity is so strong that the payee names, addresses, and account numbers always flow between bank and quicken.

Someone said he deleted his Quicken “online Payees” from the list, and it also deleted them from his bank's billpay system. I really don't want that to happen because it will be so many payees to enter again on my bank website. Or maybe I misunderstood his comment.

Thanks for your help.

Boatnmaniac

Fifth Third Bank supports another connection method that does not work with Bank Bill Pay: Express Web Connect. You could deactivate your account and then try setting it up, again. During the set up process, make sure to click on Advance Options and select the Express Web Connect option. Once set up, the Bank Bill Pay issue will cease to be an issue because EWC does not support that function.

Boatnmaniac

BTW, banks cannot set up Bank Bill Pay in Quicken. It must be initiated by the Quicken user from within Quicken.

cbowji

Thank you so much Boatnmaniac. In that case I think I must have clicked on the "online payee" in my quicken check register by mistake. I must be careful to click on my "memorized payee" and never choose "online payee."

I realize I'm doing more work by paying thru bank, and then entering the transaction manually in my register. I wish I could depend on the Quicken Bill Pay and only enter the data once; I just had a bad experience from before and would rather do some things manually and not have a tangled mess when something goes wrong, lol.

I check out the Express Web Connect at Fifth Third. Thanks again

cbowji

Hello, for anyone interested in this topic: I spoke with Fifth Third Bank reps and they say Quicken chooses the bank connection method. So I did experiments to figure out what really happens:

1. I disconnected a bank account from quicken.
When I went to reactivate, I found no way to choose "Express Web Connect" (the method that doesn't allow quicken Bill Pay). The system automatically set up "Direct Connect" (the method that allows quicken to initiate bill payments).

2. Also, when the reconnection between bank and quicken occurred, the system AUTOMATICALLY switched "online services" "Bank Bill Pay" to "YES." I had to then manually switch it to "No." (I believe we should all be able to choose "yes" or "no" for Bank Bill Pay when setting up the connection.)

3. Since the system automatically sets up "Direct Connect," and I can't find a way to change to "express web connect," any time I delete a Quicken online payee, then that payee also gets deleted from my bank's online banking.

When I add the payee back into my bank's online banking, then the payee automatically repopulates in Quicken online payee list. It seems I cannot control this. The Direct Connect method sends info back and forth.

Boatnmaniac

@cbowji - Since you are being defaulted to DC when setting up online services for Fifth Third Bank you might want to try doing the following:

Enter and save the Opening Balance transaction dollar amount into the Memo field of that transaction.
Back up your data file before proceeding.
Deactivate Fifth Third Bank.
Add Account > type in Fifth Third Bank > click on Advanced Options > select Express Web Connect > Next > follow the prompts.
During the account set up process, be sure to Link the downloaded file to the existing account already set up in Quicken.
If the Account Register Balance matches the downloaded Online Balance, then you are done and your account should now be set up with the EWC connection method.
If the two balances do not match, check the Opening Balance transaction dollar amount. If it does not match what you entered into the Memo field, change the dollar amount to match what is in the Memo field.
If the two balances still do not match, scroll through the Account Register looking for duplicate transactions that might have been downloaded and entered. Generally if there are duplicate transactions they will be within the most recent 90-days window but it might be more or less than this. If you find any new duplicate transactions, manually delete them. (NOTE: Duplicate transactions only happens sometimes, not all the time. Once this process is completed it should not be be an issue going forward.)

Did this help you get EWC set up with your account?