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Newby, two bank accounts, two businesses

larrygatz

Greetings! I'm using Quicken Classis Business & Personal. Windows v55.26
Trying to track two businesses with separate bank accounts.

When I run a P&L, both bank accounts are included in the data.

Is it possible to segregate the businesses?

Second question: one bank appears under the "Banking" section on the left, and the other appears under the "Business" section. That normal? What did I do wrong? What does this affect?

Thanks for any input.

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larrygatz

Thank you.
I set up tags to separate the businesses. But I don't understand how to use tags…to adjust reports for instance.

Business A Profit & Loss
Business B Profit & Loss

Might you be able to simplify the tag use for me? Much appreciated.

Or direct me to the explanation.

NotACPA

There's NO NEED for 2 datasets. I've run, in the past, both my IT consulting business and my wife's Business Strategy consulting business out of one data file.

In fact, having 2 datasets will prevent you from getting a complete view of your finances … which includes BOTH businesses.

And you can view the info about Tags in Quicken Help. In your Quicken reports, "Subtotal by Tag" is one of the options that's available via the Gear icon to customize the reports. Once you get, say the P&L report, for business A set up, memorize it. Then use that basis to create the report for Business B and save that under a different name.

After that, your only challenge (Q wise, anyway) will be making sure to consistently use the correct tag.

Dave335

I have used one file only for many years with multiple businesses and it is not a problem and in fact it makes it easier for me to get the whole picture of business and personal. What I do is that EVERY transaction I enter into quicken has a tag. The tag is either for myself, my wife, business one or business two. Investments I don't worry about tagging as when I download them I just save them all at once. When it comes to getting profit and loss statements you set up the report and then filter it for the particular business you want to see. Sometimes I filter for the tag for both businesses and then set the columns by tag and I'll see a profit and loss for both businesses on the same report and then a total for both of them together on the far right. Being in the same account also allows you to transfer money back and forth between the business and personal, if need be.

If you are using quicken home and business, which I recommend, they have a different set of accounts for business and personal. That took a little getting used to at first but once I got used to it I found it very useful and the business ones are tied to specific lines on the tax return so you can get a tax report out of quicken as well.

larrygatz

Dave335…Thank you. This is what I initially attempted, but I have seeing co-mingling on the P&L and I can't resolve the issue. I'll take another look at the tagging function. Right now I have every transaction tagged according to Business A or Business B.

Appreciate the assistance.

All comments

NotACPA

You can either use TAGS to separate the 2 businesses, OR, you can be selective in what accounts you include in reporting. One set of reports for business A, and another for business B.

re: your 2nd question. If you do TOOLS, Account List, click EDIT adjacent to each of the accounts and then click "Display Options" you can set the "Business" vs. "Personal" intent of the accounts.

NOTE that this doesn't set the TAX Attributes of the accounts, and it doesn't determine what gets included in the business' Income/Expense reports. Only Business categories/tags do that.

larrygatz

Thank you.
I set up tags to separate the businesses. But I don't understand how to use tags…to adjust reports for instance.

Business A Profit & Loss
Business B Profit & Loss

Might you be able to simplify the tag use for me? Much appreciated.

Or direct me to the explanation.

RalphC

I do something similar and, with two separate bank accounts, I'd suggest you create two separate data files for the two separate businesses. That would simplify report generation, not the least of which is tax reporting.

larrygatz

Thanks again…I saw a comment about datasets somewhere else, but how to accomplish that is a puzzle.

I think that would simplify my life a lot. More research! Thanks for your help!

larrygatz

All Right! This will make my life enjoyable again!
Somehow the idea of having two sets of data eluded me…what a shame!

So all I need to do is create a second file, import my bank transactions for Business B, then go into the original file and delete the bank info for Bank B. That should leave only Bank A and Business A data in one file, Bank B and Business B data in the second file.

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! and my wife thanks you too! 🤣

NotACPA

There's NO NEED for 2 datasets. I've run, in the past, both my IT consulting business and my wife's Business Strategy consulting business out of one data file.

In fact, having 2 datasets will prevent you from getting a complete view of your finances … which includes BOTH businesses.

After that, your only challenge (Q wise, anyway) will be making sure to consistently use the correct tag.

Dave335

larrygatz

Appreciate the assistance.

larrygatz

Just a quick thank you for the assistance.

I stuck with a single dataset, two companies, two banks and tags.

Works fine!

Dave335

It is all about using the right filters in your reports. Make sure EVERY transaction is tagged, both business and personal. If you have the Home and Business version of Quicken then make sure you use the business categories provided for business expenses and income and use the personal categories for personal expenses and income AND tag every transaction. The business categories are where the tax reports come from so you need to use them! Filter a report on tag for Business One. If there is commingling of transactions then drill down to the transaction level of each transaction that is wrong and see what needs to be fixed. In reports you sometimes have to filter on certain accounts to include/exclude. You may need to play with the include transfers or not in the display options in reports. Play with a report until you get in dialed in and then save as a memorized report which you will use over and over again in the future. Try what I talked about and then give us a reply and we can go from there.