Paycheck split - two line items to same account get combined into 1 transaction in register

rnoia

I've got a curious transaction problem with my paycheck/splits. My company does a partial match on our employee stock purchase program. So for my paycheck split I do:

After tax deduction: description "ESPP match" to ESPP account, for say, "$1"

then right after that another transaction for 'ESPP purchase' to the same ESPP account for "$2.5", to account for the ones I paid for, vs the ones the company gives me.

However, when I go look in the register for the ESPP account, the description is "ESPP match" and the amount is $3.5 (combined of the two transactions).

Is this normal? Why is quicken aggregating two line items of a split into 1 transaction in the destination account? This is confusing, and makes it difficult to trace errors.

My expectation is that there would be two transactions in the destination (ESPP) account, matching the exact split line item.

NotACPA

You can separate those 2 transactions by using 2 different tags.

And, they get combined because they're using the same category/account. Q has always done it that way.

In my mortgage payment, I have deductions for both insurance and taxes going to my escrow account. Since I want to track those, in the escrow, separately … I use tags.

Boatnmaniac

Or, it might be a good idea to do the following:

1. Customize your purchase as an expense category (non-taxable) by naming it ESPP Purchase. If you are using the Paycheck Setup Wizard, this would be an after-tax deduction.
2. Create a new income category for the company match portion named ESPP Match (under Employer Benefits), or something like that. My understanding is that company provided ESPP matches are considered taxable normal income which is why I suggest making this an income category. A good tax category to assign to this would be W-2:Salary or Wages, Self so it is properly captured as normal income in the Tax Planner and tax reports. If you are using Paycheck Setup Wizard this would fall under the Employer Benefits section.