Wiley Quicken 2007 For Dummies
Contents
1. EZ Pay bils crine the easy way Quicken Sil Pay 2 Tell Quicken whether you want to use the online setup for your account or manually set up your account I m going to suggest because you re just starting out that you set up your account manually You have plenty of time later on to find out how online banking works Online banking is really cool though See Chapter 6 for more information To indicate that you ll manually set up your account select the No button Note that Quicken may not get into this online banking stuff if Quicken can tell that your bank doesn t sup port online banking Tell Quicken the name you want to use for the checking account You do so by typing a name in the Name Your Account text box as shown in Figure 1 5 By the way you can be as general or as specific as you want But remember brevity is a virtue be as concise as you can The reason is that Quicken uses your account name to label stuff within the Quicken window and on Quicken reports If you use a long account name the name may not always fit on reports and screens Enter the ending bank statement date by referring to your bank statement When Quicken asks for the ending statement date enter the date of your last bank statement Enter the date in MM DD YYYY fashion 16 Part I Zen Quicken and the Big Picture Figure 1 6 The Add My Deposits And Other Income window PC Geez Ste2. s not my suggestion er obviously I say heck keep it simple You can easily add stuff later when you want it Sound okay I do explain how to set up this other stuff in other chapters My reasoning for this suggestion is that I d like you to have some experience working with Quicken before you go hog wild Focus first on those personal accounting tasks that you absolutely will want to perform This approach gets you started working with Quicken happily productively and successfully from day one If you want to do more in a week or a month or a year great You can easily do more tasks and by then you ll know so much more about Quicken that adding these other tasks will be a snap Steve s Overview You don t need to know much about the mechanics of the Quicken interface the way its windows work to begin working with Quicken especially in any chapters in which I cover the basics I provide plenty of detailed instructions but I have a couple of quick comments now Starting Quicken for the second time The second time you start Quicken and every subsequent time things work pretty much the same way as the first time Double click the Quicken icon on your desktop Or if you like doing things the hard way click Start and then choose All Programs Quicken 2007 Quicken 2007 Using Quicken document windows Quicken doesn t use document windows the way that some other Windows applications do Quicken ba
3. Edition written by Andy Rathbone and published by Wiley 2 Click Next Quicken then displays a window that asks you a few questions e The first question is whether you accept the Quicken license agreement e The next question asks where you want to install Quicken You should accept the installation s program suggestion The installa tion program suggests a Quicken subfolder in your Program Files folder e The next question an implicit question really asks whether it s okay to uninstall the previous version of Quicken if there is a previous version of Quicken installed on your computer You may also be asked if it s okay with you if it gets any program updates 3 Answer these questions by clicking the appropriate buttons Click Next to move to the next question Then click the Install Now button when you answer the last question Quicken installs itself This process takes a few minutes Along the way you see several other screenfuls of messages including marketing infor mation about the features new to Quicken and some progress reports on the installation itself Chapter 1 Setting Up Shop MBER we amp avr When in doubt about some installation option just accept the default suggestion by pressing Enter After the installation is complete Quicken displays an installation complete message 4 Click Done Congratulations You re done After you install Quicken you need to start it to
4. as shown in Figure 1 2 Get Started with Quicken 2007 Select your data file What do you want to do Open a file located on this computer FC Restore a Quicken data fie I ve backed up to CD or disk C Start over and create a new data fie How do I move a data file from another computer Exit Quicken d Back Next D D PCS Figure 1 3 The Quicken New User Setup window Ea Chapter 1 Setting Up Shop If you indicate that you want to open another Quicken data file located on the computer Quicken displays a dialog box that asks where that file is If you indicate that you want to grab a backup copy of the Quicken file Quicken dis plays a dialog box that asks where that file is Presumably if either of these situations is your case you ll know where the data file or backup copy of the data file is At the very end of this chapter in the section The mysterious case of the missing Quicken data files I describe how you can locate and open a Quicken data file If you haven t used Quicken before Quicken asks if it s okay to use the default location for the data file you should agree to this and then it automatically sets up a data file for you you don t need to worry about it After the data file is set up Quicken starts the Quicken New User Setup see Figure 1 3 This setup process walks you through the steps for setting up Quicken You can find out much more on this process i
5. company you re paying into the Name box and the payment amount into the Average Payment box or the Average Amount box But you know what Good grief This setup stuff is getting way too complicated for me Let s just skip this step too We can deal with it later on No reason to make this more complicated than we have to You ll need to click the Next Step button a couple more times click Finish and then viola Quicken displays the Quicken Home window see Figure 1 8 B ag GA A aF O Fo p 8 Reports Services Quicken com Cakndar Update Support uicke iho Quicken Home E Quicken New User Setup Cash Flow Center Cheching 0 00 0 00 Investing Cent e Add regular bills and expenses Identify all your expenses that ocour on a regular basis to help forecast your account inflows and outflows Ji Property amp Debt Wiky should I track ths 0 00 Requred felds Neme Record into ths Account Checking Average Payment Next Due Dete i 0 00 05 30 06 Add Row Total Credit Card Payments 0 00 Record into this Account Average Amount Next Due Date 05 30 06 0 00 Chedeng Tatal Expenses 0 00 Want to setup Quicken to do online bill pay Customize Add Account r e M o Don t worry you can do that later Net Worth 0 00 G Exit Setup lt Previous Step Next Step gt Financial Overview l EZ Fay bils
6. finish the setup process If you told the installation program to launch Quicken 2007 you should see the Quicken program window on your screen If you didn t tell the installation program to launch Quicken you need to start Quicken The easiest way to start Quicken is to double click the Quicken shortcut icon that post installation appears on your Windows desktop The Quicken pro gram window appears almost like magic Quicken might ask if it can download program updates over the Internet You can just say yes if it asks you this question Finishing Setup If Vou ve Used Quicken Before air If you ve used a previous version of Quicken the Quicken program might show option buttons to indicate what you want to do next Open the found data file Alternatively you can indicate that you want to open some other data file You re done You re ready to begin Quicken ing The Quicken setup process can usually tell if you ve used Quicken before The setup process knows where the Quicken installation program usually puts the Quicken program and data files and the installation program will look there If you have used Quicken before but Quicken can t see this two possibilities exist The first possibility is that you put the Quicken data file someplace weird If that s the case hopefully you remember the weird place you hid the Quicken data file If you can t remember choose File Find Quicken Data File select the disk
7. is a slight exaggeration But no kidding Migrating is problem atic If you do want to move from one program to another I suggest making sure that you have a really good reason for doing so and that you allow your self enough time to track down and correct any errors
8. orire the easy way Quicken Bl Pay 18 ar Part I Zen Quicken and the Big Picture Quicken wants you to use your last bank state ment to set up the bank account you track This way your financial records synchronize with the bank s records when you start using Quicken But want to suggest something slightly differ ent to you Go back further than just to the beginning of the previous month which is what you do when you use your last bank statement Go back to the beginning of the year and use the last bank statement of the previous year even if it s now several months after the begin ning of the year Now l m not trying to waste your time But let me point out two big advan tages to having a complete year s data in The best way to get started Quicken Tracking and tallying your tax deduc tions will be a snap and planning your finances will be easier When you enter the activity be sure to enter any outstanding checks or deposits from the prior period with their correct dates also That way they are there to check off when you do your first reconcilement Going back to the beginning of the year isn t as hard as you may think Quicken provides a bunch of tools to help you enter several months worth of data in a very short time as you can see in this chapter and in the two or three that follow B Quicken 2007 Premier QDATA Quicken Home File Edit Tools oo ee l a
9. Chapter 1 Setting Up Shop In This Chapter Installing Quicken Touring Quicken Setting up your bank or other accounts if you re a first time user Retrieving existing Quicken data files f you ve never used Quicken begin here This chapter tells you how to install Quicken if you haven t already and how to start the program for the first time You also find out how you go about setting up Quicken accounts to track banking activities specifically the money that goes into and out of a checking or savings account If you ve already begun to use Quicken don t waste any time reading this chapter unless you want the review You already know the stuff it covers By the way if you have Windows I assume that you know a little bit about it Now you don t have to be some sort of expert Shoot you don t even have to be all that proficient You do need to know how to start Windows applica tions such as Quicken It also helps immensely if you know how to choose commands from menus and how to enter stuff into windows and dialog boxes If you don t know how to do these kinds of things flip to Appendix A It provides a quick overview of how you work in Windows Read the stuff in the appendix or at least skim it and then come back to this chapter When I say Windows I mean a recent version of Windows something Microsoft is either currently selling or has sold in the last few years Quicken 2007 won t run on Wind
10. income that you want to track in Quicken If the amounts fuchunte each roperty bt month just estimate the monthly average You can change this number whenever necessary 0 00 Why should T track this Company Neme Category Teke tHome Pay How Often NextPay Date Record into this Account Salary 0 00 Every two weeks 05 30 06 Checking Want to setup even greater details of your paycheck Not ready to add this information Customize Add Account You can set a complete paycheck in the main Quicken product i No problem just dick Next Step You can enter this later Net Worth 0 00 Exit Setup Next Step gt Financial Overview l EZ Pay bils orire the easy way Quicken all Pay Chapter 1 Setting Up Shop SSS a Figure 1 7 The Add Regular Bills And Expenses window 17 But you know what You can also just skip this Add my deposits and other income step if you re lazy like me or if you don t actually have a regular source of income also like me In fact m going to recommend you skip this step Seriously Describing your outgo The third step in the new user setup requires you to describe your regular bills and expenses things like the rent or your mortgage cell phone charges and your ever increasing cable TV bill see Figure 1 7 To provide this expense information you could again if you re really anal enter the name of the
11. ld be able to solve it yourself What has hap pened if you find yourself in this boat is that you ve moved or messed around with the Quicken files using some other program such as Windows Explorer If you did that presumably you had a reason And more to the point you should know where you put the files Using the File gt Find Quicken Files command You can use File Find Quicken Data Files to select and open your existing Quicken files Here s how 1 Choose FileFind Quicken Files from the menu bar by using your mouse Figure 1 9 shows the Find Quicken Data File dialog box that appears after you choose the command Quicken uses this dialog box to collect the information it will need to find your lost Quicken data Find Quicken Data File g Find Quicken Data Fies on ts computer Look re Locs Disk C l Canc x gt 2 Tell Quicken on which disk the data file is probably stored Select the disk you want Quicken to search from the Look In list box Note that you can click the down arrow to the right of the Look In box to display a list of your computer s disks From the list of drives and folders that appears click the one that stores your Quicken files Quicken closes the drop down list box and displays your selection in the list box beneath the Look In box 3 Click Find to search the search Quicken searches the specified disk for Quicken data files As Quicken finds data file
12. n the next section oksen lt i 5 Reports Services Quicken com Calendar Update Search P 8 y Support Quicken Home Cash Flow Center 0 00 Investing Center 0 00 Property amp Debt 0 00 Customize Add Account Net Worth 0 00 Financial Overview OMERE ZOOT E Quicken New User Setup g Welcome to Quicken Personal Finance Software What to expect here This one time setup takes approximately five minutes Quicken wil guide you through the process Simoty folow the on screen instructions to add accounts and tel Quicken about your reguiarty scheduled bils ard deposits What you ll need Before you start get the folowang 1 Your most recent bank statement This is to help you set up a Quicken account to rack your real world checeng account 2 A list of your monthly bills This could come from oki biling statements or your paper check ragster You could also pent the Ist of deared checks Sam your bank s Web ste You don t need exact amounts you can ecit this later Optional You may also want the logn ID and password to your bark s Web site This may help automete some of your work i Don t have all of this information No problem you can akvays add this after you begn using Quicken Next Step gt B Pay bils orire the easy way Quicken al Pay 13 4 Part I Zen Quicken and the Big Picture a Figure 1 4 The Set Up Y
13. our Primary Checking Account window EEE Running the Quicken New User Setup Okay Here s the deal The Quicken New User Setup walks you through a three step process that asks about your banking about your income and about your regular bills You walk through the steps by clicking the Next Step button in the lower right corner of the window Describing your banking The describe your banking step asks you to provide information about your bank account and its current balance Figure 1 4 shows the window that col lects the first part of this information but just so you don t get confused here are the precise steps you take 1 Identify the financial institution usually a bank by typing your institution s name into the text box provided As you type Quicken displays a list of financial institutions that match what you ve typed so far The more you type the shorter the list of pos sible matching institutions If you see your bank or whatever listed select it When you click Next Quicken displays the next Quicken New User Setup window as shown in Figure 1 5 5 ooo one FN lt 1 a z2 Search P E Reports Services Quicken com Calends Update Support Oinckeneouy Quicken Home Quicken New User Setup Cash Flow Center 1 0 00 Set Up Checking Account _ Investing Center es Set up your primary checking account Property amp Debt wane What is the primar
14. ows 3 1 so if you want to run the latest version I m afraid it s time to upgrade 0 Part I Zen Quicken and the Big Picture Installing and Starting Quicken You install Quicken the same way that you install any program in Windows If you already know how to install programs you don t need any help from me Stop reading here do the installation thing start your newly installed Quicken program and then start reading the next section Finishing Setup If You ve Used Quicken Before If you need help installing Quicken here are the step by step instructions Installing Quicken from a CD ROM is as easy as one two three four 1 Insert the CD ROM into the CD ROM drive In a short amount of time Quicken should display the Quicken 2007 installation window I m not going to show this window in a figure There s really nothing on the window to talk about The window just reads Welcome Note If nothing happens when you put the CD ROM into the CD ROM drive don t panic First try removing the CD and then putting it in again If Windows still doesn t recognize the CD you need to tell Windows that it should install your Quicken program In many versions of Windows but not necessarily with your version you do this with the Windows Control Panel by using a tool called Add Remove Programs To do this refer to your Windows user guide or a good book about your version of Windows such as Windows XP For Dummies 2nd
15. p Reports Services Quicker com Calendar Update Online Cash Flow Investing Property amp Debt Planning Tax Reports Help Beta Quicken Home Wecresday May 30 2007 Cash Flow Center Projected Cash Flow Chechng 46 4 16 IN Investing Center 0 00 Property amp Debt 0 00 Add Total 0 00 Scheduled Bills amp Deposits Show Current by Status 7 Due Date Pay to From ey Figure 1 8 Customize Add Account The Quicken Net Worth 4 16 Home Ade Bill or Deposit Show Full win d ow Financial Overview ist Apr May 2007 aun Create New View 2 How Do 1 Customize Cash Flow Details Update Last Updated OUT WHAT S LEFT Ree Update Now Bits Current Balance Othe Doen on May 30 4 16 One Step Update Settings 4 16 Cash Flow difference for May 0 00 Add D Total Available through May 31 4 16 Total 0 00 Account Balance Graph Spending Graph May 2007 Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat 2 5 Cg Amount Web Action 6 7 8 9101112 13 14 EE 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 EJE 31 Hl Transaction actnsty 0 00 Record Edt Shp Set Up Paycheck Show Full Calendar Se Rate your payees on Zango Chapter 1 Setting Up Shop ay Now I need to explain something here The Quicken New User Setup assumes that you re going to set up almost everything you need or will ever need in Quicken all at once and in the beginning You can do that if you want but that
16. re still confused click the buttons and bits of text in the area of the Quicken window that I m talking about You ll clearly see how things work Solving Tricky Setup Problems I want to quickly go over a handful of annoying setup problems new Quicken users may encounter If you have Quicken set up and are ready to roll skip this stuff Did somebody say Macintosh You can use the existing old Quicken files you re working with a new version of Quicken In fact if the Quicken installation program can find a version of old Quicken files on your computer it gives you the option of just skipping all the Quicken New User Setup stuff In this case you just begin using your existing files I mention this point earlier in this chapter in fact If you ve been using Quicken for Macintosh however you have to export your data from the Macintosh before you can read it in the Windows version And I can think of about a million things more fun to do than exporting Quicken data from a Mac to Windows See the section in Chapter 17 on importing data from an old accounting system for a brief discussion on the procedure and some suggestions for better ways to spend your time Chapter 1 Setting Up Shop 2 1 Sa Figure 1 9 The Find Quicken Data File dialog box De The mysterious case of the missing Quicken data files If Quicken doesn t find the old files you need to open the specific files But if you have this problem you shou
17. s it adds them to the Data Files Found list box 22 Part I Zen Quicken and the Big Picture 4 Select the correct file from the list box After Quicken finds the data files stored on the specified disk select the Quicken data file you know you want 5 Click OK after you select the file Quicken opens the file and displays the active account in the register window Quicken also displays its Reminders window to show any unprinted checks or scheduled transactions Note If the file you re opening was created in a previous version of Quicken Quicken converts the data to the Quicken 2007 format Note If Quicken displays the Quicken Home page rather than the account register click the bank account name hyperlink beneath the Cash Flow Center button Migrating from Microsoft Money Suppose that you re moving from Microsoft Money to Quicken The question of the hour is this Can you reuse your old or existing Money files in Quicken The answer is Yes sort of You can download a program called Data Converter from the Quicken sup port Web site Data Converter converts Microsoft Money data files from Microsoft Money 2003 and later versions to the Quicken 2007 for Windows format Practically however moving financial information from Quicken to Money or vice versa doesn t seem to work all that well Transactions seem to get lost Account balances get messed up People ruin their lives Well maybe that last comment
18. sically turns document windows into pages that you leaf through by clicking the window buttons that appear along the left edge of the program window In Figure 1 8 for example you see buttons for Cash Flow Center Investing Center and Property amp Debt Go ahead and turn back to that page I ll just wait here for you until you get back 20 Part I Zen Quicken and the Big Picture Navigating with financial activity centers OuickTabs Quicken arranges all of its features whistles bells or whatever else you want to call them into financial activity centers For example the Cash Flow Center the Investing Center and the Property amp Debt Center are all financial activity centers You get the picture Each of these centers gets its own button For example refer to Figure 1 8 for a moment See the button that s labeled Cash Flow Center Quicken lists the features within a financial activity center underneath the financial activity center button You can collapse and expand this list by clicking the small button that s just to the left of the big financial activity center button The small button shows a minus symbol or plus symbol You can also jump to a listed feature by clicking the feature which Quicken calls a QuickTab For example see the Cash Flow Center button in Figure 1 8 See the word Checking beneath that button Checking is a QuickTab which you can click to quickly jump to the Checking account If you
19. ve you re now saying to yourself what s MM DD YYYY fashion Okay Here s an example If your bank statement is dated May 30 2007 type 05 30 2007 or you can type 5 30 2007 5 Enter the ending bank statement balance by referring to your bank statement This balance is whatever appears on your bank statement This balance is also the amount of money in your account on the date you begin your financial record keeping If you have 4 16 in your checking account type 4 16 into the Balance On The Ending Date text box 6 After you type the bank statement balance click the Next Step button to continue moving through the New User Setup Describing your income The second step in the new user setup Describing any regular income that you receive such as a paycheck and any regular deposits you make into your bank account see Figure 1 6 To provide this information you could enter the name of the payor into the Company Name box You could describe the type of payment using the Category box and could even give the amount of the regular payment using the Take Home Pay box B o e tl a H 2 6 Search P ey Reports Services Quicken com Calendar Update Support ites ZOOT Quicken Home E Quicken New User Setup i Cash Flow Center B Checang 0 00 Add Paychecks Income 0 00 Ji I ti Cent z nvesing center Add my deposits and other income 5c Sy Mais Add each paycheck and any other regular source of
20. y bank account you use to Pay b s Deposit your paycheck This account is held at the following institution iS Bark O Why does Quicken went to know my bank 7 O What if my bark isn t isted How does Quicken protect my privacy Customize Add Account Net Worth 0 00 2 Exit Setup Financial Overview l EZ Pay bils orire the easy way Quicken Si Pay Ce Figure 1 5 The Get Your Current Balance And Account Activity Directly From Your Bank window OE Chapter 1 Setting Up Shop 15 so a ae a a 5 z2 Search P e Reports Services Quicken com Calendar Update Soort Quicken Home G Quicken New User Setup g Cash Flow Center 0 00 Investing Center na Get your current balance and account activity directly from your bank gepot Debt Ea Connect to U S Bank directly through Quicken with One Step Update 0 00 C Yes I want to connect to U S Bank trough Quicken Ihave my User Name and amas F Password an T Na Ido not want to connect to U S Bark through Quicken s Find your most recent account statement and enter the statement 4 z ending date and balance L Name your account Checking Statement ending date 05 30 07 Balance on the ending date 2 stomize n gt Don t have all of your account information handy monie Hadd Account kiere forsterite Net worth 0 00 2 Exit Setup Next Step gt Financial Overview l OMCKETEAO ON
21. you want to search from the Look In box and click Find Quicken displays a list of the Quicken data files on the selected disk For more help with this you can refer to the section The mys terious case of the missing Quicken data files at the end of this chapter The second possibility is that you didn t do anything with the Quicken data file but that the data file has somehow gone missing If that s the case hope fully you backed up the Quicken data file to a CD or to some other disk from which you can restore the data file 11 12 Part I Zen Quicken and the Big Picture Finishing Setup If Vou Haven t Used PCS Figure 1 1 The Getting Started With Quicken 2007 window PC PCs Figure 1 2 Another Getting Started With Quicken 2007 window Quicken Before If Quicken can t figure out whether you ve used the Quicken program before it displays the welcome message shown in Figure 1 1 Get Started with Quicken 2007 2 Welcome to Quicken 2007 Select one of the following 1am new to Quicken Tam already a Quicken user Exit Quicken If you have used Quicken before select the I Am Already A Quicken User option button Quicken then displays another Getting Started With Quicken 2007 window that asks whether you want to open a Quicken file located on this computer restore a Quicken data file you ve backed up to CD or disk or start over and create a new data file
Download Pdf Manuals
Related Search