Where can I find an explanation of how budgeting works?

Steve Allain

This is my first time on quicken community. I have spent many days and hours trying to understand how annual view of budgeting works. I constantly have to correct the annual budget data. It is driving me crazy! Is there documentation on community of how it is supposed to work? And, if so, how do I navigate to it. My platform is Windows 11 and I'm using Quicken Classic Premier. Thank you, Steve

Quicken Jasmine

Hello @Steve Allain,

Thanks for reaching out!

If you would like to provide more information, I may be able to be more direct with assisting you. However, I have located a few different FAQs that discuss the different aspects of budgets and how to create one within Quicken for Windows. You can view these FAQS through this link, this link, and this link.

I hope this helps!

Quicken Jasmine

Hello @Steve Allain,

Thanks for reaching out!

If you would like to provide more information, I may be able to be more direct with assisting you. However, I have located a few different FAQs that discuss the different aspects of budgets and how to create one within Quicken for Windows. You can view these FAQS through this link, this link, and this link.

I hope this helps!

Steve Allain

Yes, this was very helpful! Thanks for your assistance. I configured the annual view budget as close as possible to my expectations, then I created a duplicate of it. So, if quicken makes any changes (e.g., setting amounts based on averages, or any other changes) I can revert to my backup (duplicate) copy. Then I can research to determine why a specific change was made by quicken.

I was able to configure income & expenses report to include only those items that pertain to my budget. However, when it comes to spending and/or budgeting, it is including items that I consider transfers and should not be included in my budget. I'm not sure that there is a way to exclude these transfers from spending and/or budgeting. I'm still struggling with this.

In any case, thanks for your help!

Steve

Quicken Jasmine

Hello @Steve Allain,

I’m glad to hear that the FAQs helped you configure your budget the way you intended! Your approach of creating a duplicate for backup is a great best practice.

Regarding your question about excluding transfers from your budgeting and spending reports, Quicken does provide options to control how transfers are treated in reports and budgets. You may want to check the following:

1. Excluding Transfers in Budget Settings – When setting up your budget, you can adjust which categories are included. Transfers between accounts can sometimes be categorized as expenses, so reviewing and customizing your budget categories may help.
2. Customizing Reports – In the Income & Expense Report, you can go to the Customize option and look for the "Advanced" tab. From there, you can exclude transfers from being counted in your budget or spending categories.
   
3. Using the "Exclude from Budget" Option – If certain transactions are being counted as budgeted expenses when they shouldn't be, you can try marking those transfers with the “Exclude from Budget” option in Quicken’s category setup.

If you're still struggling with this, let us know what specific transfers are being included, and we’ll be happy to guide you further!

Steve Allain

I'm still struggling with this. The only transfer I want to show up my Income/Expense by Category is FROM FID **** TO CAP1 Steve Checking **** when the Payee is Fid Bkg Svc Llc (or Memo or Tag) is Include Monthly Withdrawal. Can Quicken handle this type of filter?

Jasmine, thanks again for your assistance!

Quicken Jasmine

Hello @Steve Allain,

Could you please clarify whether you are discussing budgets or the income/expense by category report?

Please let me know!

Steve Allain

My most urgent issue is the income/expense by category report. Thanks…

Quicken Jasmine

Hello @Steve Allain,

I do apologize for my delayed response.

Unfortunately, Quicken does not currently support this type of filtering for transfers in the Income/Expense by Category report. However, there is an existing idea post requesting the ability to omit transfers from dashboard graphs: Dashboard graphs should allow omitting transfers – Idea Post

If this aligns with what you’re looking for, I encourage you to add your vote and any comments to support the request. If not, feel free to create a new idea post outlining your specific needs so the Quicken team can consider it for future updates.

Let us know if you have any other questions!