Reconciling Interactive Brokers and Exchange Rates

BarsBruD
BarsBruD Quicken Windows Subscription Member

Using Quicken Classic Deluxe (Canadian) on Windows 11. This has been going on for as long as I can remember.

I download the .qfx from Interactive Brokers for my USD denominated account. I accept the transactions and after verifying the details, I change the transaction from cleared to reconciled and then "enter". When I come back to this transaction, what was the correct exchange rate has been changed to 1.0000. As a workaround, I believe that if I remember to click inside the exchange rate field before marking it reconciled the correct exchange rate is saved.

As a side note, I often get a pop-up verifying if I want to change a reconciled transaction. I usually find that the functionality is strange. I usually have to click "no" to get my changes entered.

Comments

  • Arctic Hare
    Arctic Hare Quicken Windows Subscription SuperUser ✭✭✭✭

    I can't try to replicate what you are describing because I am not downloading transaction data from any of my brokers - none of mine support downloading into Quicken. I also don't presently have any USA demoninated bank accounts that have active transactions where I could test this (and, even then, it may function differently between investments and bank accounts).

    It sounds like you might be describing/encountering a bug, in which case, you should contact Quicken phone support and demonstrate the issue to them.

    Notwithstanding the above, I suggest modifying your workflow. Reconcile isn't meant to be set on a transaction by transaction basis like you are doing. Have you tried using the Reconcile feature as intended? Leave the transaction in cleared status until you receive your monthly statement. Then, use the Reconcile feature - not at a transaction level) and reconcile against the entire monthly statement. I've had very few issues with F/X rates doing reconcile this way. And, the only issues that I've had is handling the transactions related to using Norbert's Gambit for F/X conversions. Even then, it is just a decimal place rounding issue that can be tricky to manage - I don't end up with F/X rates set to unity.

    Do you experience the same issue if/when you use the reconcile functionality as intended by Quicken? You maybe triggering a bug that is only triggered by using an unusual workflow. If that is the case, fixing such a bug would be allocated a very low priority because it would affect a small number of people and the workaround would be using the Reconcile feature as intended.

    And, yes, I do reconcile my investment accounts against my monthly statement even though I am unable to download the transactions. That works fine!