Grasping The Concept
in [Quicken]
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From: thefourthwall on 23 Jun 2010 14:37 Hello, Being relatively new to Quicken, I am challenged to understand something and welcome all constructive feedback. My goal, using Quicken Premier 2009, is to create spending reports that track net income and spending: at this point I am not yet interested in tracking payroll deductions. Eventually, yes, but small steps first, I think. As I understand it, if I want to easily see just 'net' information, the straightforward way to do that is track net pay only. But it seems that tracking payroll deductions (esp. 401(k) deductions & contributions) will give me a more complete picture of where money is going. So, how should I create spending accounts that do not include payroll deductions? I am having trouble with this and perhaps I am just complicating things ... thanks for your help.
From: Mr.Jan on 24 Jun 2010 04:39 On Jun 23, 2:37 pm, thefourthwall <lawrence.borde...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Hello, > > Being relatively new to Quicken, I am challenged to understand > something and welcome all constructive feedback. > > My goal, using Quicken Premier 2009, is to create spending reports > that track net income and spending: at this point I am not yet > interested in tracking payroll deductions. Eventually, yes, but small > steps first, I think. As I understand it, if I want to easily see > just 'net' information, the straightforward way to do that is track > net pay only. > > But it seems that tracking payroll deductions (esp. 401(k) deductions > & contributions) will give me a more complete picture of where money > is going. > > So, how should I create spending accounts that do not include payroll > deductions? I am having trouble with this and perhaps I am just > complicating things ... thanks for your help. I completely agree on starting at the high level and then drilling down later. I find that many people try to get to the point where they have an expense account for toothpaste (for example). Once they finish with the fun part of setting up all the expense categories, the drudgery of entering the data keeps them from using the product. My suggestion is to record your paycheck as INCOME and leave everything else alone. You can go back and fix it later and there are some tricks you can use that will make it easy to change. Having the 401K is nice but your goal is to determine what you are doing with the money you have when you cash the check. Next, set up a AMOUNT AVAILABLE report that has the balance of your checking account(s) and the credit card accounts you pay off every month (not the ones on which you carry a balance and stop charging to those). This tells you how much money you can really spend at any point in time. Next, I download all my transactions and most of the vendors send a code that automatically posts to the proper expense account. Manually assign any charges that are uncategorized. Use the Quicken default accounts for a while. There are enough of them to see where your spending is going. After you have a month's data in there, run a spending report by vendor. This will show you where your money is going in broad terms and you can think about being more granular. So, if you are spending most of your money at GIANT FOODS using your debit card and realize you extract cash with your food order, you can break that out as a split transaction to CASH and GROCERIES.
From: B on 24 Jun 2010 15:09 On 6/23/2010 1:37 PM, thefourthwall wrote: > Hello, > > Being relatively new to Quicken, I am challenged to understand > something and welcome all constructive feedback. > > My goal, using Quicken Premier 2009, is to create spending reports > that track net income and spending: at this point I am not yet > interested in tracking payroll deductions. Eventually, yes, but small > steps first, I think. As I understand it, if I want to easily see > just 'net' information, the straightforward way to do that is track > net pay only. > > But it seems that tracking payroll deductions (esp. 401(k) deductions > & contributions) will give me a more complete picture of where money > is going. > > So, how should I create spending accounts that do not include payroll > deductions? I am having trouble with this and perhaps I am just > complicating things ... thanks for your help. Indeed, you may be making things more complicated than they really are. Quicken can, and should be making things easier for you, not more complicated. And it is flexible enough to accommodate the various ways that people prefer to use it. You've probably already setup accounts in Quicken for you Checking and Credit Card accounts. If you have a savings account you'll have set that up to. Other things you can setup include Categories which are used to track spending and income; and Memorized Transactions which speeds up entering transactions. Memorized Transactions know the name of a payee or payor, and can know the normal Category that is associated with that payee/payor. Memorized Transactions can also have a memorized amount. Quicken also lets you setup Reminders for bills and income, a feature that I find very important. When setting up an income Reminder, Quicken will ask if you want to setup a paycheck. Just follow the prompts and it will handle your gross, deductions and net for you, putting them all in the proper categories. Don't be afraid to try things, create backups regularly, and ask questions here.
From: Laura on 24 Jun 2010 15:42 thefourthwall wrote: > Hello, > > Being relatively new to Quicken, I am challenged to understand > something and welcome all constructive feedback. > > My goal, using Quicken Premier 2009, is to create spending reports > that track net income and spending: at this point I am not yet > interested in tracking payroll deductions. Eventually, yes, but small > steps first, I think. As I understand it, if I want to easily see > just 'net' information, the straightforward way to do that is track > net pay only. > > But it seems that tracking payroll deductions (esp. 401(k) deductions > & contributions) will give me a more complete picture of where money > is going. > > So, how should I create spending accounts that do not include payroll > deductions? I am having trouble with this and perhaps I am just > complicating things ... thanks for your help. Start by figuring out what expenses that you want/need to track. One place to start is your tax return. What deduction, if any, do you report each year? Set up categories for each of these items. These will typically be medical, taxes paid, Gross wages (to match your w-2). Add categories for your day-to-day expenses like groceries, meals, household and anything else you might want to track. Start small and add new categories as you need to.
From: Andrew on 26 Jun 2010 10:03
thefourthwall wrote: > Hello, > > Being relatively new to Quicken, I am challenged to understand > something and welcome all constructive feedback. > > My goal, using Quicken Premier 2009, is to create spending reports > that track net income and spending: at this point I am not yet > interested in tracking payroll deductions. Eventually, yes, but small > steps first, I think. As I understand it, if I want to easily see > just 'net' information, the straightforward way to do that is track > net pay only. > > But it seems that tracking payroll deductions (esp. 401(k) deductions > & contributions) will give me a more complete picture of where money > is going. > > So, how should I create spending accounts that do not include payroll > deductions? I am having trouble with this and perhaps I am just > complicating things ... thanks for your help. I try to keep a simple approach to things with Quicken. I *do* track all my payroll deductions by categories such as Federal Taxes, Medicare, etc. I do this because I like to ensure that the YTD deductions on my paystub as well as end of year W2s sync with what I have been doing. I also keep a separate category for 401K deductions. I do NOT use the 401K category as any kind of 'transfer' to another account for purchasing securities there. It is simply another category. What I do NOT do is try to manage company contributions in their own right. Since my company's 401k plan is downloadable, I have a separate Q account for those securities. So all the purchases, regardless of whether they are from my deductions or the company's matching funds simply appear as a single buy transaction every 2 weeks when they are made. If I care to see how pays what for who, I can always log on to the 401k plan website and view the gory details. As someone else pointed out, Q allows to record minutiae, but at the end, is that really helping you vs. the time it takes to do the recording? Everyone's use of Q is different, of course, but this works for me. -- ------------------------------------------------------------- Regards - - Andrew |