Scheduled transaction duplicated in register again after already matched (Q Mac)

Stewart Dale Spencer

On June 19, I posted this:

"A few days ago, it was time to pay some monthly credit card bills. I have them scheduled so I don't forget about them, but I initiate the payments out of my checking directly at the websites of the cards. I had some scheduled for the 15th and some for the 16th. I paid them all on the 15th. I marked the transactions as paid and did not give it a second thought. I think I quit Quicken for Mac after that. Later, I went back to Quicken for some reason and was surprised to see my bank account show in the red after a July 1 payment. After a brief panic, I found that three of the credit card payments were duplicated. Two of them had been scheduled for the 15th and one for the 16th. Two other payments I had made that day had not been duplicated. I did not think to make a screenshot."

It has happened every month since then. It is not a download matching problem. When I pay my credit card, I mark the scheduled transaction as paid, I adjust the date if necessary, and I also put the word "paid" in the memo field. It is always one or more of the same scheduled transactions. I have taken a Screenshot each month but I attached only the latest.

Screenshot 2024-09-20 at 1.28.10 PM.png

I am on an iMac running Ventura 13.6.9. Quicken Version 7.9.1 (Build 709.54540.100)

Quicken Kristina

Hello @Stewart Dale Spencer,

To assist with this issue, please provide more information. Did you first notice this issue in June? Which of the transactions in your screenshot is the duplicate (the "manual" transaction with the reddish pencil icon or the downloaded transaction)? Does this happen only with one specific financial institution?

I look forward to your response!

Stewart Dale Spencer

I don't remember if I first noticed it in June, or if maybe that was the second time and that's what caught my attention. But it has happened every month since June for sure. That is why I started marking my original transactions with the word "paid" in the memo field. That is what confirmed that somehow a duplicate was being created after the download match, which happens 2 to 3 days later. So the one with the red pencil icon is the duplicate. I forget, which credit cards it was in June, but in July it was Barclays Mastercard, Best Buy Rewards (a Citibank Visa card), and Discover. In August and September, it was only Discover. In each of these months, it seems like a duplicate appeared a day or two after the match. The reason I say this is that every day I look at my checking account, and all of the scheduled transactions coming up within the next 30 days. That's how I can make sure there are no problems with covering my transactions, especially my house payment that always happens on the first of the month. That is normally my low balance for the month because I don't keep much in my checking account other than what I need to cover transactions with only a slight cushion. Obviously, I want to make sure there's no problem with my house payment draft. And it fools me for a moment every month when I suddenly see I've gone into the red after the house payment, which would mean I wasn't paying attention to the previous payments. I pay the full statement balance each month on my credit cards, except for the Best Buy card, where I am paying as much as I can each month on previous, no interest promotion periods for large purchases in the past.

Quicken Kristina

Thank you for your reply,

Since it's the transaction with the red pencil which is the duplicate, and the screenshot you provided shows that the transaction is a transfer, I have to wonder if the issue is being caused by the other side of the transfer downloading. Is there a delay between when the sending and receiving financial institutions post that transaction? Is this happening only with transactions that are transfers between accounts?

I look forward to your reply!

Stewart Dale Spencer

The original transaction is an e-payment drafted out of out my checking account, with my authorization, directly from my checking account. I never thought about it before but I think this is a typical situation:

I paid the Discover bill on the 17th. The payment posted to the Discover account on that date. And then the next day, on the 18th, that transaction was matched in my Discover ledger. On the checking account side, the draft out of checking posted on the 18th. I think it did not download until the 19th, but I never really pay much attention to that. I think there is always a one day difference between the two downloads. When I make my payments in October, I will watch it very closely and keep a detailed record of what I see.

One thing is for sure, the duplicate transaction is definitely not showing up as a downloaded transaction. I always watch for those. They have the blue pencil, if the transaction was already in my ledger, or a blue dot if it was not.

It is interesting that in June and July, it was multiple accounts, but in August and September, it was only the Discover account.

Quicken Kristina

Thank you for your reply,

Please let me know what you see in October. It sounds a lot like the delay between when the halves of the transfer posting may be triggering Quicken to not realize the other half of the transfer already posted.

Thank you!

Stewart Dale Spencer

Thanks Christina. I will post a follow up here sometime between October 15 and 20.

Marys

I'm having this issue as well.

jobworker

I do too, but not on a regular basis. The transactions that duplicate are identical in every sense, dates, amount, names, Quicken name and transfer. It is just not the norm and infrequent so have a feeling it is about timing within the message download system and internet.

Stewart Dale Spencer

Okay, well it happened again this month. I paid each card separately, over a 3-day period. I checked both sides of the transaction as downloads came through from the credit card companies. (Actually, only two of the three are connected. One of them isn't compatible with Quicken, which is really annoying.) Anyway, I also watched as the payments downloaded on the checking account side. Once again, it was only Discover. But the really weird thing about it was that even though a duplicate transaction popped up in the checking register after the download, and even though it shows that it is a transfer to the Discover account, it only appeared in the checking account register, not in the Discover register. It appears to be some kind of ghost transaction. It subtracts from the balance in checking, but has no effect on the Discover account. In the attached screenshot of my checking register, the entry that says "paid" is the original.

Screenshot 2024-10-16 at 10.59.34 AM.png

Quicken Kristina

Thank you for your reply,

The behavior you describe makes it sound like Quicken is seeing the transfer, but not realizing both parts of the transfer are already in the appropriate registers, causing it to create that additional entry in your checking account.

How does the transaction appear on the credit card side? Based on your screenshot, it looks like neither is showing cleared on the checking account side yet. Did you have a manual transaction for the payment on the credit card side, and if you did, is it now matched to the downloaded transaction?

Thank you!

Stewart Dale Spencer

The original transaction is entered into the checking account as a scheduled, recurring payment to Discover. Consequently, the transaction automatically shows up on the credit card side as a recurring transaction, transferred from checking. Once I make the payment from checking, I change that one from a scheduled transaction to a paid transaction, and I add the word "paid" in the memo field, which then also appears on the credit card side.

The next day, the Discover download was automatically matched on the credit card side, showing a blue pencil. I clicked on that and changed it to reviewed status. On the same day, the checking account download was also automatically matched on the checking register. Originally, it also had a blue pencil, which I changed to reviewed status. And now, I don't remember when the duplicate transaction showed up with the red pencil, or when the original transaction was also changed to a red pencil. It may have been the next time I opened Quicken. And as I said, the duplicate transaction that mysteriously appeared, does not show up on the credit card side, even though it looks like it should.

Quicken Kristina

Thank you for your reply,

I forwarded this issue to the proper channels to be further investigated. In the meantime, please navigate to Help > Report a problem and submit a problem report with log files attached and (if you are willing) a sanitized copy of your data file in order to contribute to the investigation.

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

We apologize for any inconvenience!

Thank you.    

Stewart Dale Spencer

Thanks Christina. I will do that.