Export QIF - 10 years of Quicken data

Hi. I am in Australia. Like yourself, I originally purchased Quicken (in the US) very early on in the 1990s. Since then I have had every single version, including those supplied by Reckon upon takeover.. Consequently, I have something over 20 years of data in Quicken / Reckon Accounts. Quicken was a great product… Intuit did a great job. And IMO, this continued for a log time. When Reckon took it over, things went well for years, and I guess it is a credit to all inolved that it still runs. I can no longer speak to the US Quicken product, but the Aussie code branch is getting more and more 'clunky', and IMO, there has been very little 'visible' investment in the product. Again, IMO, it would appear to be in its cash-cow stage. I don't know if this is just internet-noise, but I feel there is a sentiment building thit it may be time to exit. The issue is lock-in. The files are proprietary and people are looking for a data export capability.

As you rightly point out, the US version has the option to export a QIF file in the file menu. The Reckon Accounts version does not. It was there at some stage… but it has been removed. Just my opinion, but I you have to question whether this is a blatant attempt at lock-in by removing one of the best means of extracting your data. You can still do it with reports and then export the report, but it is very messy. As one forum member stated, if you have years and years of data in the data file, they have you by the….

Like so many others, I have started to look at other options. I will not go into specific products, but exporting YOUR data remains a challenge.

Some clues for me were found in this post:

I am still in the middle of going through the process, but so far the following is working for me (follow my advice at your own risk - I do not pretend to be any form of expert)… To be clear, my current Reckon Accounts version is 2022. And my intent is to export the Quicken data for use elsewhere - I may return to using Reckon Accounts for a short period of time after the export for parallel running, or I may choose to stick with RA - undecided.

1. Before you do anything… backup. And backup again. COPY (do not move) all the Reckon Accounts data files you are using to a different folder/directory - call the folder whatever you like, I used 'TestQ2013' (for reasons that will be obvious shortly).
2. Prepare some reports. Before you run the reports, go into your accounts list and make sure you un-hide any accounts you may have hidden inthe past. Reports to consider printing include the Accounts list, the std Account balances report (full account list and balances), the Category List and the Security List. The lists to print off may vary depending on what you use the package for, and which features you use. The idea here is to create a set of control data you can verify data migration against.
3. Make sure you have downloaded the latest version of Reckon Accounts you are entitled to from your account on their website. You are going to need this to re-install the latest version if you want to go back to using Reckon accounts at the end of the process.
4. Within the above post, there is a link to a 'free' version of Quicken 2013. Download it. This is the US Version. You will not be able to use it
5. Next uninstall the version of Reckon Accounts you are currently using (Quicken 2013 will not install while RA is still installed.).
6. Install Quicken 2013. When it is installed, you may need to reboot. When Quicken 2013 starts, it will prompt you to register. You do not need to for the moment. Use Cancel.
7. When prompted to identify the QData file to open, pen the QData file in the 'TestQ2013' - the copy you took at step (1), NOT the file you usually used with Reckon Accounts.
8. At this point, Quicken 2013 will want to 'migrate' the file… let it do it's thing…
9. Eventually, Quicken 2013 will be done, and it will open similar to Reckon Accounts.

This is as far as I have progressed. At this stage, I have looked at the reports from step (2) and the data produced by Quicken 2013 seems to have everything in tact. The accounts and balances are correct. Currency list is there. Category list is there and looks correct. Security list looks good. Even my saved reports are there.

Most importantly, File | File Export | QIF Format… and Quicken Transfer Format (QXF) File… are both in Quicken 2013 menu.

I have also tested exporting all the transactions and categories etc. in QIF format for one of my accounts an it all worked perfectly.

What remains now, is to test the import.

My intention is to export everything using Quicken 2013, uninstall it, and re-install Reckon Accounts and do some parallel running for a short while. Note when I re-install RA, I will need to open the original files, not the file in the 'TestQ2013' folder which was used by QUicken 2013. I will then consider whether to continue my RA license.

Just one interesting observation - IMO, the 2013 version of Quicken looks so much better, and performs better than Reckon Accounts 2022 - even though the latter is supposed to be 9 years newer and is essentially based on the original Quicken product. What does that tell you?

I hope this has been helpful. To you, and maybe others.