Q2009 Bug Report - Placeholder Transactions Invalid w/Validate Command

Posted by Steven Wormuth on December 26, 2008, 10:39 pm

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Greetings,

When updating my 401(k) holdings in my new data file, as usual, a
placeholder entry is created. In previous versions, after entering a
"buy" transaction in place of the placeholder, Quicken would note that
it was intended to replace the placeholder, and zero the placeholder
out in favor of the new transaction.

In Q2009, the placeholder transaction simply disapears instead of
being replaced, and validate reports the following for every
investment transaction.

Found backfill cash transaction: "[Account Name]" 3/31/2007
"Balancing Cash Adjustment"
Found ex information for backfill cash transaction.
Found backfill pair with id: 122

This is a new behavior with 2009... What's going on?

Posted by John Pollard on December 27, 2008, 11:21 am

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Steven Wormuth wrote:

> Greetings,

> When updating my 401(k) holdings in my new data file, as usual, a

> placeholder entry is created. In previous versions, after entering a

> "buy" transaction in place of the placeholder, Quicken would note that

> it was intended to replace the placeholder, and zero the placeholder

> out in favor of the new transaction.

> In Q2009, the placeholder transaction simply disapears instead of

> being replaced, and validate reports the following for every

> investment transaction.

> Found backfill cash transaction: "[Account Name]" 3/31/2007

> "Balancing Cash Adjustment"

> Found ex information for backfill cash transaction.

> Found backfill pair with id: 122

> This is a new behavior with 2009... What's going on?

I don't believe there is any fundamental new behavior here (Q2008 and Q2007
work the same); I think your Quicken "Preferences" are different (including
the possibility that you upgraded from a version which didn't have the
Preference that allows control of the display of placeholders).

Placeholders are never "replaced": the only way to get rid of a placeholder
is to manually delete it.

But Quicken will "hide" a placeholder whose number of adjustment shares is
zero if not told otherwise. In Q2005 (and earlier), there was no way to
tell Quicken to display a "satisfied" placeholder (one with zero adjusted
shares) ... you could only force the display by entering a transaction that
caused the number of adjusted shares to be non-zero.

I'm pretty sure that Q2006 (and I know Q2007 and later) allowed the user to
always display "hidden" investment transactions. If you turn that
preference on, you'll see your placeholders, and your "backfill cash
transaction"s in the account "Transactions" tab.

Edit > Preferences > Quicken Program > Investment transactions

Put a check mark in the "Show hidden transactions" box.

The backfill cash transaction is Quicken's way of insuring that a
transaction, entered to satisfy a placeholder, will have no effect on the
cash balance in the account. I think they were always there, but if your
version was old enough, probably hidden.