Cash Transactions - Cash Account (Quicken Classic v 7.5.2 on macOS 14.2.1)

Steve_Calif

I've read many posts about tracking cash transactions using a Cash Account. I created one Cash Account for me and one for my wife. I understand the concept of transferring cash from the bank checking account to the cash account and making manual expenditure entries in the cash account to track cash expenditures there (this is a lot better than splitting every ATM transaction into many component expenditures). Before I start making lots of entries, I want to make sure I'm doing this right.

Here are the two Cash Accounts I created with starting cash balances:

Below is one transaction transferring cash from the Checking account to one Cash Account). Is this correct?

Line #2 is the original ATM Withdrawal from the bank. This was created automatically by Quicken by downloading data from the bank.

Line #1 is the transaction I manually created to transferred that ATM cash money into the Cash Account.

I would then manually enter multiple cash transactions totaling $140.00.

Is this correct so far?

Question: What is the best practice for "Payee" name for the transfer transaction #1? "ATM Withdrawal" is the Payee entry made by Quicken when we take cash out of the ATM machine on #2. But what should the Payee entry be for the transfer on #1?

RickO

I do the same thing and what you are showing looks right.

Regarding your question: Quicken forces the the Payee in both ends of a linked Transfer to be the same, so you don't have the option of using different payees for the two accounts. I think using "ATM Withdrawal" is fine although it does seem a bid "odd" to have a credit in the cash account that includes the word "withdrawal". If that bothers you, you could use "ATM Transaction" instead. Or you could just use the payee "Transfer" and then in the Action column of the checking account, put "ATM" to document how the money was withdawn.

One other consideration: unless you and your wife are compulsive about it, you will probably find that you end up spending some cash that doesn't get recorded as an expense (like the $1 for the lemonade the kid is selling on the corner, for example). You will probably find that small cash expenditures under some dollar amount just aren't worth the trouble of recording. That's fine, but it will result in an accumulating balance showing in your cash accounts that doesn't correspond to the cash you actually have in your wallets. The solution is to create a category such as "Misc. Cash Spending" and periodically make an adjustment entry in the cash accounts to bring their balances in line with the actual cash on hand. That will account for any misc. cash spending that doesn't need to be individually itemized.

jacobs

I use two cash accounts for myself and my wife as you describe. For the Payee names of the withdrawals, I have two Payees: Cash W/D (me) and Cash W/D (wife) — well I use our initials, not "me" and "wife", but you get the idea. This way, there's a QuickFill rule for each of those Payees, with the correct Transfer account saved.

Unfortunately, if your bank downloads "ATM Withdrawal" as the Payee name for ATM withdrawals, neither your bank nor Quicken can know which of you made the withdrawal. I enter these transactions manually; when it subsequently downloads from the bank, the transaction downloaded transaction is matched to the manually transaction using the correct Payee. The only problem here is that if you bth make withdrawals on the same day, Quicken might auto-match the downloads to the wrong transaction, in which case you need to Control-click on the transaction to select Reject Automatic Transaction Match and then manually drag-and-drop each downloaded transaction over the correct manually-entered transaction.

If you don't want to manually enter the withdrawals prior to downloading from the bank, then you could have a QuickFill rule for the one of you who does more frequent withdrawals, and just manually edit the Transfer field to the other person's cash account when needed.

Steve_Calif

@RickO Thanks for the input, Rick. Yeah, the word "Withdrawal" in the Payee for a deposit bugs me. I was thinking of changing it to "ATM Deposit" but that isn't really correct, either. Or maybe make the Payee me or my wife and change it to "Transfer from Checking - Wife" and "Husband - Transfer from Checking - Husband."

You wrote "unless you and your wife are compulsive about it, you will probably find that you end up spending some cash that doesn't get recorded as an expense." Lots of people have pointed that out. I think I'll just make a best-guess fractional split between the things we use cash for most often — coffee, restaurants, tips, haircuts, etc. I'll just make sure all the cash is accounted for on these items. I think that's better than a "miscellaneous" category.

My wife likes to take out $40 or $60 from the ATM and makes about ten times more ATM withdrawals than I do. I take out $300 (was $200 not long ago) and that lasts me two to three months. So it was easy to see my wife uses a LOT more cash than I do. These days, I wave my phone for probably 90% of my purchases. Even the merchants at the summer farmers' market now have Square terminals where I can wave my phone.

Steve_Calif

@jacobs Thanks again.

You wrote "Unfortunately, if your bank downloads 'ATM Withdrawal' as the Payee name for ATM withdrawals, neither your bank nor Quicken can know which of you made the withdrawal." I just used the Inspector to look at a few ATM transactions and it DOES include the last four of our ATM card numbers. We each have a different ATM card number even though they are on the same bank account. So I can always use the Inspector (manually) to see who took out the cash.

My wife likes taking out small amounts of cash. She thinks it's a way to control spending. 😂 She spends twice the cash I do and takes out $40 or $60 at a time which lasts her a week. I take out $300 at a time which lasts me a month.

So I just took your great idea of creating a QuickFill Rule "Transfer:[Cash - Wife]" for "ATM Withdrawal" transactions. For the one out of ten ATM withdrawals that are mine, it's an easy matter to change that transfer to "Transfer:[Cash - Husband]." Mine are the easy-to-identify $300 ones (big spender!).

It's no problem if we have ATM withdrawals on the same day because hers are always small and mine are always big — they easily identifiable that way. If she happens to make a big one I can always use the Inspector to find the guilty party.

Lastly, I don't see "Control-click on the transaction to select Reject Automatic Transaction Match" on Quicken Classic Mac.

Thanks again!

jacobs

Lastly, I don't see "Control-click on the transaction to select Reject Automatic Transaction Match" on Quicken Classic Mac.

If you have a transaction where you entered a manual transaction and then downloaded that transaction from your bank, and Quicken automatically matched them, then when you Control-click on the transaction, in the pop-up menu — just below Show Inspector — you'd see "Reject Automatic Transaction Match":

If you entered a manual transaction and downloaded that transaction from your bank which Quicken didn't automatically match, and you dragged one over the other to manually match them, the menu option would show "Unmatch Transaction".

If you simply downloaded the transaction without entering any manual transaction, then you won't see these choices; you'd see a grayed out "Unmatch Transaction" in that spot in the menu.

Steve_Calif

You wrote "If you simply downloaded the transaction without entering any manual transaction, then you won't see these choices; you'd see a grayed out "Unmatch Transaction" in that spot in the menu."

Yes, I see that now. Not sure how I missed that before.

How do you quote a single line like you did? If I select a line and click "Quote" it quotes the entire reply, not the selected text.

RickO

(deleted)

jacobs

How do you quote a single line like you did? If I select a line and click "Quote" it quotes the entire reply, not the selected text.

Select the text, copy it, go to the Leave a Comment box, and paste. Then click the paragraph icon to the left of the paragraph, click on the quote mark icon, and click on Quote:

A former version of this platform (Vanilla Forums) which Quicken uses for this forum allowed you to click the Quote icon at the bottom of a post and then let you edit the quoted text down to just the part you wanted, but an "enhancement" Vanilla made a while back made the main Quote button insert the entire post without allowing you to edit it. Ah, progress! 😉 So I often use the technique of copying and pasting a line from a post and making it a quote because I think it's easier to follow, particularly if you want to reply to two or more separate points in the original post.

Steve_Calif

@RickO

So I thought I could change the Payee name for the transfer into the Cash Account (so it wouldn't say "ATM Withdrawal"). But, if I change it on transfer from Checking Account to the Cash Account, it changes it in both of the transactions (i.e., the original ATM Withdrawal AND the transfer transaction to Cash).

So I guess I have to keep "ATM Withdrawal" on both of the transactions even though it obviously is not correct for the cash transfer INTO the Cash Account.

That's frustrating.

jacobs

So I guess I have to keep "ATM Withdrawal" on both of the transactions even though it obviously is not correct for the cash transfer INTO the Cash Account.

It doesn't bother me to have my cash accounts full of transactions with a Payee "Cash W/D" for money coming into the account. It's clear to me that the deposit into cash is from a cash withdrawal from an ATM. It doesn't even seem wrong to me: the transaction is money coming into the cash account, and the Payee is Cash W/D (or ATM Withdrawal), the source of the money in. 😁

Steve_Calif

A former version of this platform (Vanilla Forums) which Quicken uses for this forum allowed you to click the Quote icon at the bottom of a post and then let you edit the quoted text down to just the part you wanted, but an "enhancement" Vanilla made a while back made the main Quote button insert the entire post without allowing you to edit it. 

Now I NEVER would have thought to click on the paragraph mark in the left margin! I'm used to the previous functionality (as you are) in lots of forums where you could quote a large section and then edit down. Thanks again!

RickO

So I thought I could change the Payee name for the transfer into the Cash Account (so it wouldn't say "ATM Withdrawal"). But, if I change it on transfer from Checking Account to the Cash Account, it changes it in both of the transactions (i.e., the original ATM Withdrawal AND the transfer transaction to Cash).

I covered this in my first reply at the top of this topic:

Quicken forces the the Payee in both ends of a linked Transfer to be the same, so you don't have the option of using different payees for the two accounts. I think using "ATM Withdrawal" is fine although it does seem a bid "odd" to have a credit in the cash account that includes the word "withdrawal". If that bothers you, you could use "ATM Transaction" instead. Or you could just use the payee "Transfer" and then in the Action column of the checking account, put "ATM" to document how the money was withdawn.

What I actually do is I have two payees: "<husband's initials> - Cash" and "<wife's initials> - Cash" which I use for the checking account ATM transaction as appropriate. So that's another option in addition to the two I mention above.

To summarize Payee options as alternative to "ATM Withdrawal":

• Use "ATM Transaction" (which is neutral as to debit or credit)
• Use "Transfer" and document that it was ATM in the Action column
• Use two unique Payees: "Husband- Cash" and "Wife - Cash"