Long-standing Focus-out / -in Bug / Issue for Quicken for macOS

gerickson

It was with enthusiasm that I made the switch from Quicken 2006 to the new quasi-software-as-a-service (SaaS)-based Quicken Classic for macOS with the notion that with a regular revenue stream, the Quicken team would address bugs and issues quickly with a regular release / update cadence.

With that in mind, nearly two years ago, I escalated (and apparently had formally-recorded) an escalation and regression against Quicken 2006. More than a handful of updates later, the issue remains unresolved. In fact, when I re-escalated it to support last week, the response changed from "We've logged it and will get it into the release triage and resolution queue" to "Nope, that's a feature not a bug; suggest it in the community forums and see if you can get any traction there. If there are enough up votes, we'll consider it.".

So, here I am. For those of you following at home, this is 100% and easily reproducible:

1. Go to any account and create a new transaction.
2. Enter any additional information you'd like about the transaction (date, memo, payee, etc.); it's not important. However, what is important is entering a debit / credit / payment / deposit amount.
3. Choose any whole, non-decimal debit / credit / payment / deposit amount. For example '1'. Enter the value it without hitting enter or return or otherwise finalizing / confirming the transaction.
4. Imagine you couldn't remember what the exact decimal amount is for the transaction and that you need to Command-Tab away to email, Chrome, Safari, etc. to remember or copy what it is (I frequently need to do this to reconcile / record spending my wife emails or texts me about on our joint accounts).
5. Now, Command-Tab back to Quicken Classic.

You'll find, either to your surprise, chagrin, or both, that Quicken has chosen to auto-enter '00' as the decimal amount. So, if you entered '1' above, your transaction entry is now automatically '1.00'.

So now, you are forced to edit the entry to enter the decimal amount you actually wanted from (4) above.

This behavior does not occur on Intuit QuickBooks 2024 Desktop for Mac, Google Sheets, Microsoft Excel, or Quicken 2006.

Despite that, the support agent argued "Quicken's behavior is consistent with all other financial software in the marketplace". That is correct insofar as you hit enter or return to finalize / confirm a non-decimal transaction amount such as '1'. It's effectively auto-completing a default '.00'. That is fine and is consistent with most other financial and numeric software.

Changing focus via Command-Tab should not default the transaction decimal amount; only enter or return or the UI/UX equivalent thereof should finalize and confirm the transaction, not a temporary change of app / window focus.

MontanaKarl

Just verified the behavior. I can't say that I personally care that it does what it does… could be annoying but I've never had the need to do this. And, as a database app, the completion allows the entry to be saved when switching away… vs potentially being lost if there was a system crash/shutdown/whatever…and I'd rather have the rest of the transaction saved with the wrong decimals that nothing saved. But that would just be my personal vote.

Anyway… this post if not an idea thread that will get upvotes. It is an excellent/thorough post for this errors forum.

If you want to see this voted on and implemented … enter a feature request in the following forum (where you need to select the appropriate sub-area- e.g., Display/UI - for the function after starting a new discussion in the Mac area):

https://community.quicken.com/categories/quicken-mac

gerickson

Thanks, I'd thought I was doing so, but cloned the issue over there:

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/7959452/make-focus-out-in-transaction-auto-entry-a-preference-or-restore-quicken-2006-behavior