When Does Transaction History Work?

Transaction history only works if there is an underlying transaction. One example is a bill payment. If you open the bill or the payment you will see the other transaction.

If you open a check or credit card transaction that is not linked to another transaction there is no transaction history.

Open the transaction. You will either see Journal or Transaction history as options on the upper screen.

That info is actually contained in the Journal History. Transaction History only shows whether other transactions are linked to the current transaction.

Understood on Transaction History.

On Journal History, it would be desirable for them to rework that feature to show an audit trail for the specific transaction you are examining.

There is an Audit report that will give you some info on transactions but I like your suggestion. Go to help and send feedback to Intuit. Just remember that if a transaction is deleted there is no way to view that audit information other than through the Audit report.

My impression is that Intuit stopped listening to people a long time ago. They do their product feature surveys and they seem to feel very safe hiding behind those.

I think QB is already slow enough as it is. :)

Yeah, I think the audit trail is pretty much useless the way it's implemented now in QB. Sure, it can show you (after freezing up your entire server) who screwed up your data, but you'd probably know that already. But if you really needed to do some serious auditing, i.e. to prosecute someone for embezzlement, it would carry no legal weight, as opposed to material evidence like forged checks.

It would not introduce delays unless you used it. If you needed to use it, that wouldn't be much different than running a report.

It's still useful to know who is originating and modifying suspicious or problem transactions.

Might try a quick report and see if you can add the columns you are looking for. If that works, memorize the report.

If it was the same as running a report, why would you need this feature? After all, you can easily customize the audit trail already to search on a specific transaction.

Unless you're talking about something extreme like forensic accounting, you'd already know who from the "entered/modifed by" header.

Do you understand the difference between bringing up an audit history on one transaction and see:

1/1/2011 User X Created 1/2/2011 User Y Edited 1/10/2011 User X Deleted

and getting an audit trail with 10,000 line items, and having to manually go through that to find the three transactions you care about?

Come on!!

The 1/10/2011 transaction should have been an Edit not Delete.

Huh? I haven't messed with the audit trail much so correct me if I'm wrong, but I understand it can be pre-filtered just like any other report before you run it.

1) Selecting a complex filter to map to a specific transaction history takes time and is a hassle. It certainly wouldn't be as convenient as a button that says "Audit Trail" inside the window of the transaction. 2) Can you explain what combination of filters would let you see the above transaction history for a specific check in a bank account, for example?

Would it now? Even with memorized transactions?

I already explained to you that the audit trail has the same filters as any other report. Which means that if a certain transaction can be located through a report, the same can be located through the audit trail. I would suggest acquainting yourself more with QB's reporting functions in general, before criticizing any perceived lack of features in the audit trail.

The audit report is more powerful than ordinary reports because it can report on deleted transactions.

I'm familiar with filters. The feature I am suggesting is easy to use and very convenient and extremely important for forensic accounting. The feature you are suggesting to use is cumbersome, slow, inconvenient, and requires more advanced skills to use.

QB already has the Transaction History feature but as explained before it is only available when there are other transactions linked to it. It is NOT intended to be used as an audit reporting tool. that's what the audit report is for.

using your suggestion...how would you deal with a deleted transaction? It does not exist. you can not display it on any report. so how are you going to see the history behind it without the use of the Audit report????

As for your comment that using filters requires advanced skills.....you need to learn how the program works or find another program that suits your needs.

I am not asking for Transaction History!! I am asking for an audit report for the currently selected item.

Since my point appears to be escaping people, let me be literal. The History button would remain and would continue to show the Transaction history as it does today. The new feature I am requesting would be a new button to the right of History that would be something like "Audit" and pressing this button would show you the forensic accounting history of the current entry. It would be the same information that the Audit report shows but for the specific selected item. If that item is a bank account line item, the history of changes to that line item would be shown, including importantly the user who made the change, the date of change, and the details of before and after the change.

Did I ask for the Audit report to be deleted? Of course you still need the Audit report for many applications.

Ridiculous and flippant remark.