Scary QD2010 error

Well now, something if definitely screwed up in Quicken as almost the exact same error has occurred in another seldom-used credit card.

Once again, I had recently used the card for a small charge after a long period of inactivity. Once again, the accounting entry that threw the account into error had to have physically occurred sometime in July, but affected periods well into the past. Once again I determined that the entry that was in error was the "Opening Balance" entry, marked as reconciled, The only difference between this recent event and the one I described above is that this time the "Opening Balance" entry was recorded as a "Charge" (liability) of $121.34 instead of the "Payment" I found in the above-described event.

I have a feeling that this error is being introduced by Quicken via the OSU process.

Going back to the 1st instance of this error and looking more closely at the register, I found a payment - a real, actual payment - dated

Since I don't remember when I set up this account for OSU I'm

1) I started OSU in June 2010 (anyway of determining that?)

The facts are somewhat clearer to me in the more recent event. The $121.34 "Charge" shown in the 8/27/2007 "Opening Balance" entry is the exact amount of a June, 2010 charge for $117.81 plus a foreign exchange fee of $3.53. I remember "accepting" each of these transactions downloaded via OSU. Again, somehow, these two entries were combined into an adjustment of an 8/27/2007 Opening Balance entry that originally had a balance of $0. What's unclear to me is the date of these two transactions as shown in the "Accept transactions" window when I accepted them. I'm fairly certain that the dates shown were June, 2010 dates, but I wouldn't swear to it.

It does seem to me that the "Match/New" algorithm in Quicken needs some tightening up, as has been mentioned here before.

Tom Young

OK, this is getting old. This error just happened again today, this afternoon.

Immediately after a OSU I noticed that yet another seldom-used credit card had what looked to be an incorrect balance. Since I'm getting to be an old hand with this problem I just scrolled up to the top of the register and, once again, the "Opening Balance" entry - an entry that I've *always* established as a $0 entry, had a charge of $40.08 that wasn't there this morning. (I confirmed this by opening the last Quicken regular backup, which just happened to be this morning, and verifying that the "Opening Balance" entry was $0.)

This error was introduced silently via this afternoon's OSU. When I did the OSU there was one transaction downloaded, a payment on the account in the amount of $22.66, which was correct and I accepted it. Unlike the two previous errors documented above, I couldn't see any entry in the register that OSU might have "keyed" on to come up with the $40.08. All entries in the register had either a 'c' or 'R' in the Clr column, there were no single entries of $40.08 anywhere in the register and the "recent activity" in the account (previous activity was back in Feb, 2010) were 2 transactions amounting to $22.66 and the payment.

I guess at the point I get to talk to India.

Tom Young

Tom,

Just a thought.

It appears that the entry involved is always the Opening Balance entry which is $0.00. Why not delete it and see if that solves the problem.

As a general practice, I always delete the $0.00 Opening Balance entries that are automatically generated when setting up a new account. I see no reason to have a $0.00 balance entry in the register. Of course, I don't delete them if they have an actual balance.

Richard:

You may be right, but I'm running out of "seldom-used" credit card accounts to test it on!

The fact that this has happened with 3 different FI's (Citibank, Chase and BofA) suggests the problem resides in Quicken, though it would seem like other people would be running into this issue and I haven't seen similar reports. I've alerted Quicken to the problem (perhaps a Complete and Utter Waste of Time) and I'm now looking more closely at credit card balances immediately before and after OSU.

Tom Young

You could create a new Windows folder; create and open a New Quicken file in that folder (making that new folder; the "current" folder); restore any backup that has the $0 opening balance transaction; delete the opening balance transaction; and do another download to that restored file.

You could then delete the entire new folder when you were through testing.

Well, that was interesting.

I made 2 copies of a backup that had the $0 opening balance transaction in the CC account involved in error #3. 1st, just to see if the error would repeat, I went to the Online Center, selected the FI - Chase - and clicked on "Update/Send." The $22.66 payment was downloaded, and I accepted it. This time there was no adjustment to the Opening Balance transaction and the balance for the account was correct.

Puzzled, I opened the 2nd copy of the backup and did a regular OSU. Once again, the only transaction downloaded was the $22.66 payment, and once again I accepted it. However, this time the Opening Balance transaction *was* affected, showing a charge of $17.42, the exact amount of *one* of the 2 recent transactions that added up to the $22.66 amount I owed.

I suppose I could try again with the Opening Balance transaction deleted, but the fact that it might work once probably wouldn't constitute proof that it's in some way connected to the error, given what just transpired.

Tom Young

I'm not sure what you want to "prove". But my thought is that, if you want to increase the chances that Intuit can recognize, and fix, a problem ... it could be benefical to gather, and publish, more evidence.

You normally explain problems very clearly - that's something that software developers appreciate (if not, requre). You could provide your evidence at: