transactions tab in Quicken for Mac

irwinfayne · January 8

I recently switched from Windows to Mac. In the Mac version of Quicken I don't see a downloads tab which shows all downloaded transactions before I've accepted them, and give me the opportunity to accept/reject and also edit transactions.

Can someone tell me where I can do this in Quicken for Mac?

Jon · January 8

Quicken Mac doesn't handle that the same way. Downloaded transactions are put straight into the register and you review them there; there's no way to accept, reject, or edit them first.

Accounts with newly downloaded transactions will have a blue dot next to them in the Account sidebar, and newly downloaded transactions will have a blue dot in the Status column in the register (or a blue pencil if they've been matched to a manually entered transaction). You can click on the status indicator in the register to mark a transaction as reviewed (in which case the blue indicator goes away); you can also mark all of them as reviewed at once from the same pop-up menu. Once all the transactions in a register have been reviewed, the blue dot on that account in the sidebar will disappear automatically.

smayer97 · January 8

I'd also suggest that if you still desire to see this feature added in to QMac, you can add your vote here:

Restore Transactions Downloading Acceptance and Matching workflow to Quicken Mac

Do note that Quicken has indicated they do not plan to add this feature, even though it is one of the most requested features among hundreds, because there are SO MANY reasons for its usefulness, and I argue, for its necessity, but if there continues to be enough demand, they might be enough motivation for them to reconsider.

irwinfayne · January 8

I've been using Quicken about as long if not longer than you have, hanging on for I'm not sure why since it's so easy to check/find checking and credit card transaction on my phone app and since I really don't have need for budgets or spending reports, perhaps thinking I may someday have need to look at very old transactions which I practically never do.

In light of my questions as to what do I even need Quicken for, I was particularly annoyed when a few years back you could no longer use a standalone version and instead had to be sucked into the annual renewal model. But again I just went along with it.

So it's surprising that Quicken can't be bothered to add such a useful tool to its software, instead simply arrogantly advising that it will not.

I think I'm finally pushed over the edge. So long Quicken, thanks for the memories, and color me done.

Chris_QPW · January 8

I personally see this completely differently.

I'm a Quicken Windows user, and I do like the automatic transaction entry mode, which is basically the only mode in Quicken Mac. BUT the main reason I see this differently is because when I look at all the problems that have come up because Quicken Windows has both methods, I agree with the developers, both systems shouldn't be in the same program.

Quicken Windows would be better off if they never had implemented the automatic transaction entry mode, and not only would there have been less problems, but they could also have used that time for other more useful features.

In Quicken Mac, the fact is that it was implemented this way, and large parts of it depend on that. Putting the Downloaded Transactions tab in would cause all kinds of problems.

Note that Quicken Windows got "automatic transaction entry mode" just about the same time Quicken Mac Essentials was created and got the concept from Mint. It is definitely a "patch" on Quicken Windows. Just as the Downloaded Transactions tab would be a "patch" on Quicken Mac.

jacobs · January 8

So it's surprising that Quicken can't be bothered to add such a useful tool to its software, instead simply arrogantly advising that it will not.

@irwinfayne Users ask for hundreds of different features. Such requests get analyzed to determine if it would help users, how many users, how much time it would take to implement, where it fits into other planned changes, etc. Some of the requests are implemented, some are put on a schedule to be implemented in the future, and a few — very, very few, actually — are rejected because the developers feel there are other/better ways to achieve what is being asked for and/or complexity that makes it difficult or time-prohibitive to implement.

It's not arrogant that the developers don't implement every single feature suggestion users submit. One reality is that the small Quicken Mac development team isn't anywhere near large enough to implement every idea. (Some ideas which have been accepted by the developers are still awaiting implementation a year or more after being marked as "Planned.") The other reality is that implementing every feature request would lead to a bloated and hard-to-maintain program. (Quicken Windows suffers from some reliability and updatability problems precisely because so many features have been added over three decades of development.)

I understand that you came from Quicken Windows, and it handled this functionality differently. But have you actually tried using Quicken Mac that way @Jon described for a couple months? I know that most of us are resistant to change. I came from the legacy Quicken Mac product and initially dislike some things in the modern Quicken Mac because they were different from what I was used to — but over time I have come to actually prefer some of the differences, and accept others which are neither better nor worse, but different. The in-account status of transactions works pretty well for most people. (There's also a preference setting you can change for blue dots in the left sidebar to flag either accounts with new transactions or accounts with unreviewed transactions.) If you've worked with it for a while and still found it problematic, please share what problems you're having.

irwinfayne · January 8

I could get behind your comment if the ask (by me and apparently many others) was for a new feature that isn't on the Windows version. But instead, I do consider it arrogant to leave off a useful feature from Windows and basically refuse to implement it on the Mac version of the same software. But that attitude is in line with Quicken's decision to discontinue letting me use a standalone version of Quicken that I bought/paid for and which was working just fine before Quicken decided to strong-arm its customers into paying an annual subscription price.

I'm glad you like Quicken, but I don't. The subscription model does nothing to improve or add features that I had on my purchased stand-alone version, and now to not even have a primary Windows feature on the Mac version is, IMHO chintzy and, yes, arrogant.

And finally, Quicken may think it's the indispensable cat's meow on money management software, but again not IMHO. The tools that Bank of America and Chase give me for my checking account/credit card suit me just fine in lieu of what Quicken is selling. And I surmise I'm not alone in that opinion.

Chris_QPW · January 8

Bank of America and Chase give me for my checking account/credit card suit me just fine in lieu of what Quicken is selling.

And yet, neither have a "Downloaded Transactions tab". Neither of them even has a "review".

But it is now "essential" just because Quicken Windows has it.

That is a poor excuse in my opinion for putting in features. As you pointed out Quicken isn't the "standard" that all money management should have to conform to. It has its share of bad ideas. Certainly, in context with new ideas.

One of the principal reasons for rewriting Quicken Mac (which is BTW the reason it isn't fully featured yet; these things take time) was to make Mac like Quicken not a copy of Quicken Windows.

jacobs · January 8

I do consider it arrogant to leave off a useful feature from Windows and basically refuse to implement it on the Mac version of the same software.

But my point was that there are hundreds of features, some large, some small, which exist in Quicken Windows and don't yet exist in Quicken Mac. They are slowly plowing through the list, but they've been at it for the past nine years since launching the modern Quicken Mac, and they'll be at it for years yet to come. They can't match every Quicken Windows feature when Quicken Windows had a 20+ year head-start on development, and when their revenues don't provide for a substantially larger development team.

Again, I know the way they implemented this in Quicken Mac is different, but the Mac implementation does address similar functionality to the Windows version. So far, what I've heard you say is: "I want to do it the way I used to do it in Quicken Windows", but not "I tried doing it the way Quicken Mac is built, and it falls short for the following reason(s)…" In fact, one could say it's arrogant to just expect them to change the program because you don't want to change the way you worked in the past! 🤣 (Please don't take offense, I was just being light-hearted with that last comment.)

The question for the executives and developers is: should they devote time to building an alternate way of doing something which can already be done in Quicken Mac, or should they focus on building things which currently can't be done at all in Quicken Mac? My observation over the years has been that they sometimes do the former, but mostly do the latter. Ask users who can't generate a budget-versus-actual report, or can't enter mergers and acquisitions, or can't create and save investment reports, or who don't have lifetime planner/tax planner/debt reduction planner/savings goals features, or who can't generate charts of investment performance or spending over time, or who can't enter stock options/RSUs, or who can't hide categories or tags related to grown children or diseased/divorced spouses, or who can't rollover budget over/under amounts from month to month, or — I could go on and on, but hopefully you get the idea — if they would like those features created before the developers devote time to an alternate way to handle reviewing downloaded transactions.

But that attitude is in line with Quicken's decision to discontinue letting me use a standalone version of Quicken that I bought/paid for and which was working just fine

I actually think these are very, very different issues. Switching from perpetual use to subscription use was a policy decision based on increasing revenue and decreasing upkeep expenses. I understand the reasons software companies move to subscription pricing, but I don't think many people like subscription pricing. The only thing I like about it is that it probably allows them to survive by having a steady flow of income; since I want to continue using Quicken, I want them to survive — even though I don't like paying more for it. That's a policy decision made by financial, marketing and executive leadership, not the programers.

On the other hand, deciding what features to devote their development time to is generally not made by policy-makers and top executives, but by the development team. As was noted by smayer97 above, what the developers have said is that this feature isn't currently in their plans, but that doesn't mean it can't/won't be revisited sometime in the future after they have made progress on many of these other features which they have decided are higher priorities.

The subscription model does nothing to improve or add features that I had on my purchased stand-alone version

I will respectfully disagree with you on that. When modern Quicken Mac came out in late 2014, I found it conceptually fine but woefully short on features. I actually continued using my old Quicken 2007 for several years because I felt it served me better. But over the years, the developers added more and better functionality, and I eventually switched, and haven't looked back. (There still some features from the legacy Quicken Mac 2007 which haven't been implemented, and which I hope they will get to one day, but for the most part Quicken Mac today meets my needs. Any inconveniences from missing features are, for me, outweighed by having a rock-solid reliable modern database and a modern program which will continue to be supported and developed.) I'm not saying that it would have been impossible for them to make any improvements in Quicken Mac without the change to subscription pricing, but I do understand how it allowed them to cut the work of maintaining multiple years of different versions and invest that time in accelerating the efforts to make Quicken Mac better. So while subscriptions cost us more, I do believe there have been tangible benefits to users.

I'm glad you like Quicken, but I don't.

Nothing wrong with that. 😀 Quicken meets some people's needs, but not everyone's; Quicken provides value for the cost for some people, but not everyone. I'm not saying you should like Quicken because I do.

But I am saying two things: (1) that there are legitimate reasons why the developers haven't been able to implement everyone's desired feature requests, and (2) that rather than condemning them for that, you might want to try using it the way it's built to handle reviewing downloaded transactions, even though it's different than what you used when you used Quicken Windows.

irwinfayne · January 8

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20409083#Comment_20409083

true, and neither of those companies charge anything for those apps, so as they say, beggars can't be choosy. But being forced into an annual subscription fee (after rendering my paid for stand alone version unusable) makes me something more than a beggar, entitling me to be a little more choosy, namely, asking for a feature that they had already included in the Windows version.

Look I get that you love the product, so we'll just have to disagree about both the program and the company behind it. Same thing goes for the other person who responded to this thread voicing his support for the current Mac iteration of Quicken.

irwinfayne · January 19

update:

okay after using Quicken Mac for a while, the lack of a download transactions table no longer bothers me. I'm finding it easy to just double click the category of a new downloaded transaction if I need to change it. And (drumroll) I actually like that I don't have to accept individual transactions but instead can select all the new ones when I'm done and bulk change status of all of them to reviewed.

But I'm still grumpy about having been forced into the subscription model when my stand alone version was doing exactly what I wanted :)

Chris_QPW · January 19

But I'm still grumpy about having been forced into the subscription model when my stand alone version was doing exactly what I wanted :)

One has to temper this with the fact that if they didn't do this, the alternative might be that they just stop making Quicken.

okay after using Quicken Mac for a while, the lack of a download transactions table no longer bothers me. I'm finding it easy to just double click the category of a new downloaded transaction if I need to change it. And (drumroll) I actually like that I don't have to accept individual transactions but instead can select all the new ones when I'm done and bulk change status of all of them to reviewed.

On of the things I have to constantly correct (by posting my own comment with the correct information), and a few of the Windows SuperUsers will never acknowledge is that putting the transactions directly into the account and then reviewing them isn't this:

"If you are relying on Quicken to "automagically" fill your account registers from downloaded transactions, you may run into problems. Despite all efforts by the Quicken programmers, the "Autopilot" (that's my name for the part of the Quicken program which processes downloaded transactions and converts them into new register transactions) is not infallible. "

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20411051#Comment_20411051

There are a few things that Quicken Windows does like automatic transfer detection that is pure guess work, but putting the downloaded transactions into the register involves no more guess work than running them through the Downloaded Transactions tab. And the very fact that Quicken Windows has both mode makes explaining this and getting down to the actual problem a person might have in this area doubly hard because you don't know which mode they are using.

I think it is very big of you to come back and acknowledge that you were wrong about this. I too find having the transactions go right into the register works better. Unfortunately, because of some bugs in Quicken Windows it doesn't work right in investment accounts, and most people have to turn them off thee. And the very fact that it is a "dual system" means that the bugs never get fixed, because the response by the SuperUsers is just to turn it off.

Austin@ · January 19

I’m in the same boat. Once I got used to the transactions going straight into the register in Quicken Mac, I much prefer it to the old workflow in my Quicken Windows days (especially with how clear and easy to use the status indicators on transactions are in Quicken Mac).

transactions tab in Quicken for Mac

Answers

Categories