credit card - both charges and payments add to total net worth on the summary page, credit card page balance never accurate

m.carry473's Avatar

m.carry473

26 Oct, 2024 05:36 PM

For my credit card both charges and payments add to total net worth on the summary page. Which also means that the credit card balance is not accurate or useful. Specifically:

1) the credit card transfer from checking adds to the assets of the credit card; this is seen in both the credit card transaction page and in the "summary" page "net worth."
2) when I add downloaded .qif files from Capital One credit card, the balance of the credit card and the net assets of the summary page also increase.
Thus both credit card charges and credit card payments increase my "net worth." I.e., the summary page lists my net worth as banking (e.g, $100) and credit card (e.g. $50) as $150 instead of $50. And the credit card balance is useless.

Setup
On the summary page, the credit card is in the "credit card" and liabilities section and the checking is in the "bank" and assets section.
When a payment is transferred from checking to the credit card, the amount is appropriately deducted from checking.
I can see both sides of the transaction in the payment from checking to the credit card.
The transactions in Moneydance and on my institution bank/credit match dates/amounts.
I have disabled custom themes and extensions.
I have tried to find these setting posted in help sections and can't find them, for example
         Default Transaction Settings Verify the default transaction settings for your credit card account: Go to "Account > Edit Account" for your credit card. Click on the "Register" tab. Check the "Default Increase" and "Default Decrease" settings: For credit cards, "Default Increase" should typically be "Charge" or "Expense". "Default Decrease" should be "Payment" or "Transfer".

I found this
       Online Transaction Download Settings If you're downloading transactions: Go to "File > Preferences > Network". Look for an option like "Ignore Transaction Types in Favor of Amount Signs" and enable it if available.
And I clicked this today this but then how do I reset several years worth of transactions in two credit card accounts? Does every transaction have to be changed manually? Which would not be possible, though I am already more than a whole workweek into this quicken to moneydance transition over the last year.

I am sorry that hours of searching didn't work. I did try many things before asking. Thank you for any help.

  1. 1 Posted by bcurtis on 26 Oct, 2024 10:28 PM

    bcurtis's Avatar

    I’m just a user and new to Moneydance at that, so take my suggestion with the proper grain of salt. I think you should be able to fairly easily adjust your transactions with batch change. I presume all of your charges are showing up in the Payment column in your credit card register.

    If you can easily sort your account register by something like Check#, Description, or Memo so you can sort out your payments from your charges it will be easy. You will need to highlight all the charges then right-click->Batch Change->Amount. The default in the Batch Change Amount dialog ({value} * -1) will multiply all your highlighted entries by -1 and your transaction amounts will shift from the Payment column to the Charge column.

    As always, be sure to make a backup before you proceed.

  2. 2 Posted by m.carry473 on 27 Oct, 2024 02:59 PM

    m.carry473's Avatar

    Thank you so much for responding.

    This did not work. I did a batch change of all "charges" using that formula. (Note, the formula pre-populated.) However, all the charges then simply migrated to the payment column. In addition to not having credit card charges and payments not separated, the balance column then became the absolute value of every transaction, charge or credit.

    Again, thank you for responding. I wish I didn't need an accurate cash flow, but since I do I hope there is some way to correct for credit card both charges and payments add to total net worth on the summary page and for the credit card balance to be accurate.

    Any other suggestions?

  3. 3 Posted by bcurtis on 27 Oct, 2024 03:05 PM

    bcurtis's Avatar

    For this to work you have to be able to differentiate between charges and payments and you. have to be able to sort the transactions so they are separate and you only apply the batch change to one or the other (depending on which one is in the wrong column). Each credit card is different, but mine typically have the Description field with “External Withdrawal” or “Withdrawal”. If I sort on Description it puts all the payments into one block so they can all be selected or excluded from the selection of the entries you need to reverse.

  4. 4 Posted by bcurtis on 27 Oct, 2024 03:15 PM

    bcurtis's Avatar

    I should add that you will have other credits besides payments and they might be more difficult to sort out. If you have all your transactions with categories it should be pretty easy (soft on category and batch change as appropriate). Otherwise you’ll have to look for credits like cash back awards. Returns may be more difficult.

  5. 5 Posted by dtd on 27 Oct, 2024 05:53 PM

    dtd's Avatar

    @m.carry473 - some credit cards create malformed QIF files (my Kohl's capital one card seems fine, but others not so much.

    I agree with bcurtis' previous two messages on how to fix a QIF file that doesn't have the signs correct.

    However, have you considered downloading QFX files (Quicken OFX) instead of QIF? They might not have the same issue QIF import appears to have for you.

  6. 6 Posted by m.carry473 on 29 Oct, 2024 12:34 AM

    m.carry473's Avatar

    @ bcurtis, Thank you for the response. You wrote
    For this to work you have to be able to differentiate between charges and payments and you. have to be able to sort the transactions so they are separate and you only apply the batch change to one or the other

    I was able to exactly that the first time. I changed ONLY the charges. However, when I applied the formula, those charges switched to payments column. They didn't switch value in the charges column.

    A bizarre side effect was that my net assets then became the absolute value of all (former charges) plus all payments.

    I do appreciate your time with the recommendation.

  7. 7 Posted by m.carry473 on 29 Oct, 2024 01:02 AM

    m.carry473's Avatar

    Thank you @ dtd. I had not considered QFX files. I did that and replicated the same problem. Was worth trying and appreciate the response.

    This is really nuts. Is there somebody I can hire to help solve this? It might take just minutes?

  8. 8 Posted by bcurtis on 29 Oct, 2024 02:51 AM

    bcurtis's Avatar

    It makes sense that the charges would be switched to the payments column. If you do the batch change again they will switch back. If they are still backwards after you do that perhaps a formula applying absolute value instead of multiplying by -1 will be the way to go.

  9. 9 Posted by Stuart Beesley ... on 29 Oct, 2024 07:31 AM

    Stuart Beesley (Mr Toolbox)'s Avatar

    I’m not entirely clear I understand the issue.

    Can you send a screenshot of several transactions that you think are wrong. Capture both sides. Ie a SS from bank, and another with the matching txns from CC

  10. 10 Posted by sth on 29 Oct, 2024 05:56 PM

    sth's Avatar

    It seems that the issue is when you download from Capital One to the credit card account and it creates a set of new transactions which are positive (increasing value) of the credit card account instead of negative,

    I am using MD+ (Plaid) for my Capital One account it has behaved correctly.

    I just downloaded both the QIF and OFX versions:
    The QIF files has the transactions as negative

    D10/05/2024
    T-72.99
    
    as does the OFX file, which calls it a "debit" of "-72.99"
        <TRNTYPE>DEBIT</TRNTYPE>
        <DTPOSTED>20241005000000.000</DTPOSTED>
        <DTUSER>20241004000000.000</DTUSER>
        <TRNAMT>-72.99</TRNAMT>
    
    I have unchecked ignore transaction types in favor of amount signs.

    (NOT IK Support)

  11. System closed this discussion on 28 Jan, 2025 06:00 PM.

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