Reconciling investment accounts

Al snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com:

No, Quicken does not know the amount. It only knows the cash balance it calculated by adding and subtracting the values in transactions you entered, either manually or by downloading from your FI.

Reconciliation compares what Quicken thinks happened with what your FI is telling you happenned. So Quicken wants the cash balance from your statement. Hopefully they will match. If not you should be investigating to see where the error is.

The real problem is that Quicken does not allow us to change the font size in investment registers. Someone once explained why. I forget the details -- something about how the investment registers aren't really registers. Thtls a lame excuse. Quicken is a progran that is displaying information on my screen and it should let me adjust the font.

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Microsoft Windows has a feature Control Panel | Display | Change the size of all items. Until Quicken adds the feature you want, you can use this feature instead. It will blow up all your programs by the same amount, which is not ideal. But we old guys do what we must.

Persevere.

Hi, Porter, Thanks for your reply, but my point is that if Qkn can calculate the Cash Balance to post at bottom of register, they can well calculate again to automatically enter in the reconciliation window.

I misswrote if you understood that I was saying Qkn has a datum in a dedicated field which can be referred to time and time again. I also didn't mean to imply, for those who might have thought so, that I was talking about screen scraping.

After decades in IT systems analysis & design, and program management, I should have expressed myself better. Sorry. However, my argument still stands unanswered by Qkn folk.

Al wrote

" ... if Qkn can calculate the Cash Balance to post at bottom of register, they can well calculate again to automatically enter in the reconciliation window".

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Your logic is faulty.

The only reconcile balance that Quicken automatically presents in a reconcile window is the "online balance", and then only when the user has elected to "reconcile to the online balance". The only accounts that allow reconciling to an online balance are non-investment accounts that are activated for downloading.

But Quicken does not automatically put the online balance in the reconcile window to save the user key strokes, or to compensate for the user's poor vision.

Quicken puts the online balance in the reconcile window because the online balance is the ONLY balance allowed when you reconcile to the online balance.

For all other reconciles, the user is (logically) expected to key in the desired balance: there is no reliable way for Quicken to choose the appropriate balance for a reconcile that is not to the online balance.

I'll throw in my two cents...

When I reconcile, I always use the balances of a statement obtained from the financial institution. No squinting required.

The issue with using Quicken's calculated balance is that it defeats the purpose of the reconciliation which is to detect any differences between Quicken and the financial institution's records.

"The real problem is that Quicken does not allow us to change the font size in investment registers. Someone once explained why. I forget the details -- something about how the investment registers aren't really registers. Thtls a lame excuse. Quicken is a progran that is displaying information on my screen and it should let me adjust the font."

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There are two problems with your claim.

First: there was no "excuse" being offered ... "lame" or otherwise; just facts.

Long ago (Q2003 or Q2004) Intuit consciously/intentionally, elected to change investment accounts from being treated virtually the same as non-investment account "registers" to being treated as what Intuit called "Transaction Lists".

I don't recall Intuit ever explaining the reason(s) why they did that, but I think you can bet that it was not an idle whim. Making significant changes to software is something manufactureres are reluctant to do without what they believe to be good reasons. Intuit's choice to employ Transaction Lists does not require any excuse; regardless of whether you would argue with Intuit's reasons for doing so (if those reasons were known).

That change did not appear at the time to have quite the same significance that it does today, largely because not even non-investment account registers had the capabilites then they have today.

Second: investment accounts have capabilities today that they - and even non-investment accounts - did not have prior to Q2003/Q2004. That is: improvements have been made.

While it is true that even then, investment accounts lost the ability to have their fonts changed in the same way as non-investment accounts; Intuit was well aware of the problem ... and they (Intuit/Quicken) have made modifications to subsequent versions of Quicken to allow some changes to investment accounts that were not available when the original change was made.

For example: Investment account "Transaction Lists" now allow columns to be sized; that was not possible for some time after the original change was made (it was also not possible for non-investment account columns when that change was made).

Investment account Transaction Lists now can have their font size changed by employing the "Use Large Fonts" option you noted. That should take care of the original poster's complaint.

The bottom line here is that software (just as any product) will never please everyone; it is bogus to complain that just because a user's pet peeve exists that the software manufacturer is incompetent or uncaring. The manufacturer must try to satisfy the maximum number of users while still making sufficient profit to stay in business ... a requirement for every business. Businesses that fail to do that will go out of business - or, at the least, any product they sell that fails to make a profit will stop being produced ... just as happened with Microsoft Money.

Sorry, John, but in Investment accounts register (transaction list, you said in a related post) the balance presented (and of interest here) is CASH BALANCE.

Qkn reconcile does not present option to automatically go for "online balance" in investment accounts. The two data boxes presented in the reconcile window are "PRIOR CASH BALANCE", with Qkn filling in that amount, and "ENDING CASH BALANCE", into which the user types the figure appearing below the register (transaction list) as "CASH BALANCE".

So, I still think my logic is not faulty. Let Qkn calculate the cash balance amount twice.

BTW, Sherlock talks (in another post in this thread) about using balances from FI statement. That's good for monthly reconciles - if statement is paper, but not for weekly exercises.

So, John, I would appreciate it if you would share additional thoughts on subject.

As to target audiences for software developers, I started in IT at division level in a global company when the division management couldn't get attention from the Corporate IT folks. Remember the sarcastic/ironic joke/statement "Hi, I'm from Corporate and I'm here to help you!"

I don't know what it says about this subject, but, for the record, I wound up growing my career after being "recruited" up to that same Corporate level world. Yeesh!

It is good for weekly exercise, too. All the financial institition's investment web sites I use provide a "statement" by date.

Hi, Sherlock. Why not calculate CASH BALANCE twice? The requested figurefor the ENDING CASH BALANCE is exactly what the register/transaction list displays as CASH BALANCE. This has nothing to do with the FI's data,

Appreciate your sharing.

"Al" wrote

Sorry, John, but in Investment accounts register (transaction list, you said in a related post) the balance presented (and of interest here) is CASH BALANCE.

Qkn reconcile does not present option to automatically go for "online balance" in investment accounts. The two data boxes presented in the reconcile window are "PRIOR CASH BALANCE", with Qkn filling in that amount, and "ENDING CASH BALANCE", into which the user types the figure appearing below the register (transaction list) as "CASH BALANCE".

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I think you need to re-read my previous reply to you ... much more carefully than you did.

For example, you reply that "Qkn reconcile does not present option to automatically go for "online balance" in investment accounts".

But that is exactly what I said in my previous post, when I said: "The only accounts that allow reconciling to an online balance are NON-INVESTMENT accounts that are activated for downloading." [Emphasis added]

And the reason for that is there is no such thing as an "online balance" for investment accounts. An "online balance" is defined by the OFX specs, and it only applies to non-investment accounts.

An "online balance can only supplied by the financial institution. And since an online balance is only applicable to non-investment accounts, financial institutions do not download any such balance for investment accounts.

Also note: a.) No Quicken account that is not activated for downloading can have an "online balance". b.) There are Quicken investment account types to which you can download, but that can not have a cash balance (such as "Single Mutual Fund" accounts).

[I spent over 48 years designing and writing software. But resumes are not meaningful here. There a good number of Quicken users who have never written a line of code who are, nevertheless, excellent analysts of Quicken problems.

If you choose not to use the cash balance obtained from a statement provided by the financial institution, what are you actually reconciling?

I suggest reviewing the built-in documentation obtained by clicking on the question mark in the lower left corner of the Reconcile window when prompted for the Ending Cash Balance.

I bow unconditionally to John, Sherlock, Porter Smith, Master Guru White and numerous others far superior to me on Qkn issues ... ... BUT ... some atavistic obstinacy remnant from lizard times multi-generations ago in the back of my mind makes me respond.

Help page popping up after clicking (thanks, Sherlock) blue background question mark in lower left corner of reconcile window makes references to shares and other stuff. John writes about online balances.

Folks, I WISH I could paste a JPG image of a screen print (of one of our investment account's register/transaction list and superimposed popup reconcile window) which I have enhanced with suitable red arrows and ovals highlighting displayed text, but, alas, this is apparently not possible here. (Pity, it is very artistic.)

Our investment accounts are made up of a regular brokerage account and six IRA accounts - three apiece for my wife and me. The reconcile window for any of these investment accounts (at least in our case) have only three (3) boxes available for user filling-in, to wit ...

a. Date labeled "Ending Statement Date" (filled by Qkn) displaying "today" date, but which clumsy fingers in past have proven to be over-writable (such blunder always followed by exiting and starting over)

b. Currency field labeled "Prior Cash Balance" displaying that figure.

c. Currency field labeled "Ending cash balance", left blank in expectation user - ME/US - will fill in with figure appearing below register/transaction list and labeled "Cash Balance".

Sorry I can't be more clear on issue I am looking (squinting a better word choice) at.

Your commiserations are appreciated. Further thoughts bearing on issue are most welcome.

The Ending Statement Date and the Ending Cash Balance should be obtained from the financial institution. Using any other source defeats the purpose of the recocile.