I am yet to review your comments. I will do so shortly and reply in due
course.

Thank you.

"Michael Gordon" <gordonm[at]denison.edu> wrote in message
news:eDo70s3CHHA.3660[at]TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...
- quote -

You can deal with the inexplicable insistence in a retirement account by
just identifying it instead as tax-deferred -- which really is the same
thing, but gives more flexibility in this and other areas (e.g.,
reconciliation).

--
Michael Gordon


"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:uA%23gpbfCHHA.3380[at]TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...
- quote -

You are correct. I described it in error.

"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:uA%23gpbfCHHA.3380[at]TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...

- quote -

Where's the commingled cash in this scenario?

Yes, I didn't **need** an associated Investment Cash Account (except for
retirement accounts where Money inexplicably insists on one).

No, the Investment Account can't hold any cash. (Again, ignoring the
MMF/CD/etc. Investments.)

You can't Transfer : My InvOnly Acct cash to it. (You can Buy Investment/CD
: My InvOnly Acct with a cash-like Investment as noted above.)

Yes, I can create a share Buy of an Investment with no Transfer From
account--as though the cash for the buy just fell from the sky. (I can do
that in an Investment Account with an associated Investment Cash Account as
well. Nothing unique about this ability for an Investment account lacking an
associated Investment Cash Account.)

But after I've entered the transaction, there's still no cash position in
the Investment Account. Just an Investment position.

Maybe I'm not getting what you mean by "they permit commingling cash and
investments".

Or I'm still missing something else.

"Chris Cowles" <spam_magnet[at]remove-me-bellsouth.net> wrote in message
news:%23bXWSTfCHHA.3380[at]TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Sure. Uncheck "Track cash transactions". You'll get a dialog box warning
about Armageddon. Process through that. It deletes the cash transaction
portion of the account.

Go to the account, add a buy. You can either designate a bank account, or
ignore it. If you designate an account, the cash comes from that account as
a transfer. If you ignore it, nothing happens. The account summary reflects
share value, but not the fact the shares were generated spontaneously from
nothing.

The same is true for sells and dividends. They don't affect the value of
the account, if not transferred out, except to the extent it decreases
shares.

Retirement accounts require cash accounts.
--
Chris Cowles
Gainesville, FL


"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:uC8eu%23SCHHA.992[at]TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
- quote -

"They permit commingling cash and investments"

They do?

I just tried this--at least one quick test case, I didn't make a science
project out of it--and I can't figure out the cash part. (Ignoring for a
moment the MMF investment cases.) Granted, my answer may have been biased by
my initial skepticism that lead me to test it in the first place.

Earlier in the thread we deduced that there already was an Investment Cash
account setup here.

"Chris Cowles" <spam_magnet[at]remove-me-bellsouth.net> wrote in message
news:%2320dQnSCHHA.3540[at]TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Now we are getting somewhere I think I can deal with on this one as well. I
think I'm finally in sync with what you are seeing and where you are seeing
it.

The Loan : Mortgage Payment is (likely--I'm doing remote surgery here)
coming from the scheduled Expense we spoke of earlier. (A schedule bill for
category Loan : Mortgage Payment that adds up to 300.00 per month.) I think
we decided this should probably be coming from a Special Category Loan
Payment : [mortgage account] instead, but no matter. It shows up under the
Debt heading because Loan Mortgage Payment is assigned to the Budget version
of Category Group Debt.

The 'Other Expenses for "Loan : Mortgage Payment"' is there to allow you to
add any additional expense you expect/anticipate for the Expense Category
Loan: Mortgage Payment that Money doesn't already know about from something
scheduled. Double-click on it and you will see how you would go about
entering an other amounts you wanted to budget against this category.) No,
you can't make these lines go away. They are there to help you get a better
budget by giving you a place to tell the budget about things it can't figure
out from previously scheduled items.

Here's a classic example of why you need these lines. You KNOW you will
spend 200.00 per month more or less on Food : Groceries. You cannot and have
not scheduled any transactions for Food : Groceries. But you know you need
to budget the expense. You go to the line for Other Expenses for "Food :
Groceries", double-click on it, and tell Money to budget 200.00 per month.
Likewise, say you know that you want to spend $2000.00 on Vacation :
[various subcategories] but obviously have nothing scheduled yet. You go to
Other Expenses for "Vacation" and add a $2000.00 annual expense there.

Hopefully this helps.

"Apr" <noreply[at]mail.com> wrote in message
news:uz5UCTQCHHA.3540[at]TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Has the point been made that non-retirement investment accounts do not
*require* cash accounts? They permit commingling cash and investments in
the same register/account. Does that affect any decisions on this topic?
--
Chris Cowles
Gainesville, FL


"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:OPsplQSCHHA.3540[at]TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
- quote -

One down. Many to go.

You can't transfer to the "other half" of this account as cash since the
other half of this account is for Investments. You CAN use a Buy
Investment/CD transaction. It is another of these MAGIC Special Categories.
It transfers, for lack of a better word, cash from a Cash Account to some
investment vehicle (Money calls these Investments) in an Investment Account.

Say you were going to buy $1,000.00 worth of google stock. You'd enter a
$1,000.00 Buy Investment/CD transaction in some cash register. Money will
then ask you what investment and what account do you want to hold it in.
You'd specify one of he Investment Accounts (say like the one you've now
found you have) and define the Investment for Money. (It wants to know
things like type--stock--ticker symbol, etc.) Money would then need to know
either the per share price or the number of shares, and, if applicable, any
commission you paid. At the end, Money will not have the $1,000.00 in the
cash account but will have however many shares of google stock in the
investment account. It will then value the Investment Account based on what
it determines or you tell it the investments are worth per share times the
number of shares.

"Apr" <noreply[at]mail.com> wrote in message
news:Ov5JtKQCHHA.4472[at]TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Sorry, it's difficult to explain.
Here is an example :
-Debt
300 Total
Loan: Mortgage Payment
(*red up arrow symbol) [Company] -
Monthy - 300.00
(The above suggests it comes from withdrawl or bill. The amount comes from
the register or the bill)
Other Expenses for "Loan: Mortgage Payment" - Monthly -
0.00
(The above...I do not know where is comes from....)
Subtotal
- Monthly - 300.00

*Red up arrow symbol stands for withdrawal or bill. It appears that all my
withdrawal or bills have the "extra row" called Other Expenses for
"[Category]". Do you think this is referig to a "Other Expenses" Category.
I took at look at the Categories page but cant see it there...? Any
suggestions where I should look?

Thank you again.

"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:%23Mq$7iMCHHA.1824[at]TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Thanks very much! I found Cash Transactions on the sidebar. I didn't even
notice it there. Then I found my transaction that I have Transferred to the
Account. I've been wanting to sort this for so long!

Further to this, instead of Transfer to 'Cash Transaction's page, is there a
way of entring the amounts on the 'Investment Transactions' page instead?

Thanks again.


"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:%23rNptaGCHHA.992[at]TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Got me. I don't download data. Nor do I recall ever having seen entries like
this. This typifies why I avoid budget threads.

Perhaps there are some transactions getting trended that are not
categorized?

I'm also struggling with the terminology you are using as it **appears** to
be non-conformant to the terms Money uses. I think you mean:

For most of my expense categories I get an "extra row" called "Other Expense
for [category]" with an amount of zero. Editing the entry suggest it is
coming from the 'downloaded' expense [?????] from the Register [??????]
which has an amount populated. [??????]

"Apr" <noreply[at]mail.com> wrote in message
news:OW3H0xDCHHA.3476[at]TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...
- quote -

My knee-jerk reaction from available data and way too long working with this
stuff follows:

I don't think it's a Category. I think it's an Account and I think your
transaction entry is a Transfer : Group Personal Pension - GI (Cash). In
this scenario, the "Group Personal Pension - GI (Cash)" is the name of the
Money account the Money is transferring to. In this scenario, the issue is
that the (Cash) account may be a little non-obvious how to find.

Go to Account list.

In the Investment Accounts section do you have an Account called Group
Personal Pension - GI?

If so, click on that account. On the upper left corner of that register, is
there a label that says Cash transactions?

If you click on that, do you find your transfer to the Investment Cash
Account associated with the Investment Account Group Personal Pension - GI?

I either batted 1.000 with this path or 0.000. (That's American baseball
lingo.)

But in more direct response to your posted Q, if the Category is really in a
Transaction, the Category cannot not be there. The tool will NOT allow you
to categorize something with a Category that does not exist. It's
fundamental to how Money works. If you wanted to add that category and it's
really used in a transaction already, Money will tell you you can't create a
category that already exists. (Here I discount the possibility that your
data file is corrupt. From all of the data I have from all of your threads,
I consider this a possibility too remote to consider just yet.)

"Apr" <noreply[at]mail.com> wrote in message
news:O2bHlsDCHHA.4672[at]TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...
- quote -

New Budget: I have created a new budget. For most of my expenses I get an
"extra row" called "Other Expense for Name of the account" with an amount of
zero. It refer to the 'downloaded' expense from the Register which has an
amount populated. If I edit the item, it has 0. How do I delete this and
prevent it from happening for all the items, except the ones I entered
manually?


"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:e0BWvGqBHHA.1012[at]TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Ok, I will setup a new buget later...

I created an Account Transaction report and found the pension transaction.
Double-clicked and went to the payslip. The Category is called "Group
Personal Pension - GI (Cash)". I went to Categories and it is not there.
Perhaps it was deleted by mistake... What's the best way to create this
category?

Thank you in advance for your help.

"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:e0BWvGqBHHA.1012[at]TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...
- quote -

You know the drill.

"Apr" <noreply[at]mail.com> wrote in message
news:ON6WzIoBHHA.140[at]TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Go into Budget and Edit the budget. From there you can see what's already
there and edit each entry.

- quote -

The latter would work, but starting a new budget might give better results,
particularly if you've changed/added lots of scheduled transactions.

- quote -

Well, it's a mystery for the ages then. The Transfer:[name of account] has
to be going somewhere. Here's what I'd consider doing to figure this out. Go
to the Account Transactions report. Customize it for a narrow date range,
like where the Transfer: is that you can't find the other half of. Beyond
that, customize it to show all of everything else. All Accounts. All
Categories. Show all Transfers. Reconciled/Unreconciled. Etc. Then look for
an item on the same date in the same amount but with an opposite sign. If
you find it, double click on it to get the Transaction view. Assuming it's
really going into the ether, I think we'd need to a) go down the file repair
paths--but nothing else indicates an issue of this nature, or b) re-examine
exactly how the Transfer was setup in the payslip transaction. Is it
possible, say, that Transfer is mis-spelled and a new category with some
goofy named subcategory has been created?!?

Pse see inline below:--
- quote -

Where would I establish the budget amount for the zerod entries?

- quote -

I don't think I have a baseline. I was just entring items manually and via
recurring bills. I think need to rework the budget. Can you suggest a
standard method that Money users do or should I just go via the 'Edit the
Budget' option and amend/add from there?

Yes, I'm using Advanced Register.

- quote -

My register is showing 'all dates'. I did try to enable 'Cash Transaction'
but I was still unable to see the 'Transfer' in the Pension Account. I am
unable to download transactions for this account. I did mention the blue
lighting in another thread but it was for another account.

"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:%23bImMqZBHHA.3620[at]TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...
- quote -

You know the drill...

"Apr" <noreply[at]mail.com> wrote in message
news:%23oIZDOVBHHA.1196[at]TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...
- quote -

All of the budgets "work" more or less. Except for AB, Microsoft seems happy
with the ways they work, so it is unlikely they will ever be "fixed". They
want to make AB go away because, alternately, it's viewed as much too
complicated for their target audience, it generates too much support costs
because it is complicated and, well, difficult, and because the issues
people have with it would cost too much to fix right. The thing with all of
the Money budgeting models (there are now three or maybe four different
ones) is that they work the way they work. Lots of people want them to do
things differently to fit how they want to view the problem. But they can't
get there from here. Look through past budgeting threads (probably the
second most active subject area on the newsgroup after problems with
downloaded transaction data) and you will see what I mean.

Bottom line: you can make all of the budget models work if you are prepared
to invest the time to understand how they work and to validate their results
vs. you situation. To validate their results you will almost surely have to
change the ways you categorized some things or the ways you have some things
scheduled or some of the ways you want to consider your financial activities
vs. your budget. If you aren't prepared to do these things, you will have a
rough time of it and probably not get satisfactory results.

As to your specific question re. "extra zeroed entries", I suspect that what
the budget is telling you is that this is a category that it knows you are
using but for which you haven't established a bidget amount.

- quote -

I'm not sure what the baseline is you are comparing manual entry to.
Autobudget of Advanced Budget? Im general, I think you will get the best
results if you start out with as many things as possible already in
Scheduled Bills and Deposits. That gives Money some idea of your financial
plan before you even start to try and create a budget.

- quote -

MEss you'd probably know because it would only have been downloaded within
the last several months and you wouldn't have an account to transfer to with
that name and you wouldn't have been able to transfer. Essential vs.
Advanced Register shows up in the upper right corner of the registers and
only applies to M05 or above. If you are using M4 or below, the question is
irrelevant as there was only one register model.

So, you entered a payslip transaction into, say, the Account Register for
your, say, Checking Account. In that payslip you had a line, typically on a
Before or After Tax tab, that was categorized Transfer:Pension Account
(contributions). If that's what you did, all's well so far. Then you should
be able to see this money show up in the account register for Pension
Account (contributions). There are lots of reasons it could be in that
register but the register isn't showing it. Reasons I'm thinking of are the
view settings of that account for period of time and reconciled status. If
downloaded transaction data for that account is involved, there is another
whole layer of ways that this could be confused, not to mention the
Essential vs. Advanced Register questions. I think you'd mentioned the blue
lightning bolt in another thread. This indicates that the financial
institution associated with the account supports direct connect or you've
setup for third party downloads..

Please see my replies below.

"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:elE8%23VRBHHA.4892[at]TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Oh, I didn't know that Budget was not in a 'usable' state. Does that
mean that Advanced Budget and Essential Budget features both do not work at
all? Do we know when it will be fixed? Is what I am seeing with the 'Extra
zerod entries' the problem and related to the automatic feature where Money
asks you "do you want to enter this into the budget".

.....Sorry about these questions, but it is 'safer' to enter the budget
manually? Or is it completely a no-go? ... )

- quote -

Please let me know where do I check that I am using ME or Essentail
Register? You've mentioned that I change the category to Transfer
Transfer:[name of pension account], which I did within Payslip. I am using
the Money model, although when I did the transfer, I selected the 'Name of
Pension Account (contributions)' which was the only item in the list. I
then checked the Pension Account itself, under Cash Transactions, nothing
was there. I am unsure where the amount went to..? Any ideas please?

I avoid budget questions where Money is involved because they usually end
sadly. (Advanced Budgeting in Money is broken. My understanding of it is
broken. My understanding of it is broken but it's broken too, so we are
even. You can't get there from here with it. It doesn't work the way you
want it to work. Stuff like that.) But I have one potential answer below.

"Apr" <noreply[at]mail.com> wrote in message
news:OifHS6QBHHA.4472[at]TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Are you using Money Essentials (MEss)? Or Essential Register? If not: use
Transfer:[name of pension account], assuming that you are modeling some
pension account in Money.