Comments (scroll down to add your own):

1. This is the reason I dont like quicken or msmoney.
   Now I use a excel file, but like a budget.
   Something like this:

   Spend planned effective income available
   house 450 445 1500 76776.32
   food 300 223.20
   gifts 100 100
   … … …
   Total 750 768.20 1500

   On begin of the month I do the planning for the month, and I track on cell of effective the spend.
   Like: =123.21+23.43

   Of course Available is the value of the bank balance. In this way, in the begin of the Month I know exact how much money I will need to the month and track if I’m on budget or not.

   It works for me (and my wife!!) for 3 years.

   Every Quicken tentative fails after 2-3 months.

   Nelson

   Comment by Nelson Faria — Sep 12th 2005 @ 6:39 am

2. I don’t use Quicken/Money anymore because of this. In my post on budgeting money, I make available the excel spreadsheet I use.

   Comment by Financial Fruition — Sep 12th 2005 @ 8:35 am

3. I use MS Money, and use it as my check register, since I have laser wallet checks that I print from the computer (the advantage of working at a check printing company…)

   I try not to use checks more than I have to, anyway, since it is so much safer to use credit. I put all of my charges on the card and pay it off every month. It is an easy way to subtract the credit balance from the bank balance and make sure that there is still a bank balance.

   Comment by Blaine Moore — Sep 12th 2005 @ 9:14 am

4. Yeah, I hardly write any checks myself. But I still find myself being strangely attracted to keeping track of all transactions on paper as well as in Quicken. Old habits die hard, I guess. Also, the dual-entry system helps find errors (although most errors are on paper, so ditching that probably wouldn’t hurt).

   Comment by nickel — Sep 12th 2005 @ 9:26 am

5. I find the best way is to structure my MS Money time. I used to obsess about it, but I now block off 1/2 hour 2 times per week where I update everything. That is all I spend, except for 2 – 3 times per year when I do some deeper analysis. If I am out anything under $5, I don’t worry about it and move on. Time is too expensive to waste on that amount of money.

   Good post, good topic.

   The Dividend Guy

   Comment by The Dividend Guy — Sep 12th 2005 @ 5:43 pm

6. nickel…this is me to a “T” as well

   I also track ALL cash expenditures and it just burns when I have to allot any discrepancy at all (from 2c to $2) to “misc” grrrr

   I could go on, but it’s embarrassing

   Comment by Caitlin — Sep 12th 2005 @ 5:59 pm

7. Fortunately for me, I don’t track individual cash expenditures. Regardless, I’ve managed to balance everything perfectly every month since January of 1997. I guess it’s become a point of (perhaps misguided) pride for me now. After such a run of perfection, I just can’t bear to break the streak.

   Comment by nickel — Sep 12th 2005 @ 6:06 pm

8. Ha! I’m just the same way!!! But I don’t often get problems — Quicken is just too good.

   Comment by FMF — Sep 12th 2005 @ 8:10 pm

9. Yeah, Quicken is good… But sometimes I’m not!

   Comment by nickel — Sep 12th 2005 @ 8:18 pm

10. I’m surprised you still use a paper check register if you’re already using Quicken! I just enter the few checks I write in Quicken, and the rest of my transactions are mainly automatic payments that are set up in the “scheduled payments” list. When my checking account statement is available from the bank, I use Quicken’s reconcile feature, which usually highlights any mistakes really easily.

    Comment by Madame X — Sep 14th 2005 @ 7:47 am

11. Finally, someone else with the same Quicken obsession disorder (QOD) as me! I keep meaning to stop manually entering things and trust the downloads, but I can never bring myself to do it. I wonder if there is some sort of place where people like us can seek help?

    PS If anyone wants the latest version of Quicken, Intuit just sent me some pretty good coupons… I’d be happy to send them to you so that you too can commiserate with us QODers. You can reach me at jelgie [at] gmail.com. I think it’s $10 off but don’t quote me on that.

    Comment by Jamie — Sep 20th 2005 @ 2:16 pm

12. Jamie, I don’t use the auto download features because I want to know every penny that I spend. I do not want to have something downloaded that I am unaware of and just don’t notice; I put everything in by hand. But, I don’t keep a paper register, I just use my computer.

    Comment by Blaine Moore — Sep 21st 2005 @ 8:19 am

13. I’m the same way about not downloading, as I want to know exactly what’s going on. I’ve eased up a bit on this, though… I now at least download my credit card statements rather than entering every transaction by hand — since we pay in full every month, I used to just track credit cards as a split check with the transactions entered individually in the split. Crazy… I know.

    Comment by nickel — Sep 21st 2005 @ 8:30 am

14. that IS crazy nickel! LOL

    I use the download feature for every account possible (the checking acct stopped working with the de-support of QIF) at LEAST once a week

    I’ve also taken to adding a placeholder transaction in the checking account (I put “HOLD” in the check number field) on the date I plan to pay money toward a CC. I update it to match the balance on my CC every time new txns download. This gives me a very clear sense of my checking account cash flow. When I make the payment, I flip the HOLD to say EFT since I pay these online

    But I do hand enter all cash txns – usually weekly – from little scraps, notes and receipts. that way I always know the money went toward. Got that from “your money or your life”

    Comment by Caitlin — Sep 23rd 2005 @ 6:32 pm

15. See, this is why I just don’t track everything through Money, only credit card downloads (and therefore spending). I’d be up all night worrying about 23 cents.

    Comment by Jonathan — Sep 26th 2005 @ 1:20 am

16. Maybe I’m being ignorant, but spending no more than 15 mins every night and 1/2 hour to 1 hour every weekend should get you reconciled to the penny. Not a lot of time to know where the money is going. Now if I could only do the same with exercising!

    Comment by Gabe — Sep 26th 2005 @ 3:17 pm

17. I somehow missed this piece when it was originally posted, but saw it on your most frequently discussed list and had to read it. I recently posted about a similar experience and got several “interesting” comments.

    However, I really wanted to comment about the following:

    “When it comes to balancing our books, I’m a Quicken addict. And beyond that, I’m a perfectionist. So whenever I sit down to reconcile our bank statements with our check register and Quicken, I just can’t stand discrepancies. It’s so bad that I’ll spend a ton of time poring over our check register searching for the error that made it fail to agree with Quicken’s bottom line.

    In fact, even if I’m absolutely certain that the balance in Quicken is right, I’ll still search out the math error that caused the discrepancy rather than simply correcting the balance in our checkbook.”

    I am the EXACT same way!!!

    Comment by FMF — Dec 2nd 2005 @ 11:26 am

18. My wife and I just spent the $19.95 for the YNAB Excel system. Pretty cool stuff! Basically, it works like this. You first save up a month’s worth of expenses (as in money, not in bills you threw in a drawer, LOL). For example, when March 1, 2006 rolls around you already have the money to pay all expenses for March. You can accomplish this with the help of the Primer software (another Excel application). Then, on February 28th (for example), you divy out that money to your expenses for the month of March.

    Comment by Tom — Feb 14th 2006 @ 11:13 pm

19. I am very much like you in the perfectionist regard FCN. I could never let something like that go on without fixing it. The way that I got around it is by not using a checkbook. I have not written a single check in about 6 years. I pay all my bills online and give cash for birthdays if needed. It makes life a lot easier and it can all be transferred right into Quicken automatically.

    Comment by RS — Mar 13th 2006 @ 12:48 pm

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