Importing payroll information

[David Carlson]

On 1/16/2014 9:25 AM, Derek Atkins wrote:
> Oh, right, the QIF Importer will put the M field into the Transaction
> Notes field, not the Split Memo, assuming you also have a P field. If
> you don't have a P field then it will promote M to the Description.  You
> are right that there may not be a way to populate the "main split" memo
> field.
>
> -derek
>
> "R. Victor Klassen" <rvklassen at gmail.com> writes:
>
>> Not clear to me just how it supports it.  Perhaps you have a different
>> spec that explains it to you, but I’m not finding it in the Wikipedia
>> spec.
>>
>> Putting it in the M field appears to have no effect.  
>>
>>
>> On Jan 15, 2014, at 11:01 AM, Derek Atkins <warlord at MIT.EDU> wrote:
>>> I don't understand your issue.  Just supply a memo for the "default
>>> split".  QIF supports that!
>>>
>>> -derek
>>>
>>> -- 
>>>       Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
>>>       Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board  (SIPB)
>>>       URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/    PP-ASEL-IA     N1NWH
>>>       warlord at MIT.EDU                        PGP key available
>>
>>
I used to think that all 'automatic' methods of transaction generation
intentionally left the transaction notes field blank because there was a
plan in the future to fill that field with the contents of the current
account register split memos, similar to the way Accounts Receivable
transactions are displayed. 

I know that field is not copied from the source transaction when a
scheduled transaction is created by copying an existing transaction.  I
also note that when the OFX importer imports transactions it tends to
fill that field with import status notes rather than actual transaction
text, at least when importing files from my banks.

As to the existence or not of a QIF 'Spec' , I think that Intuit always
considered it to be their property, and when they stopped supporting
that method in their 'Quicken' product line, they removed their
documentation from their website.  Thus whatever can be found on the
Internet today should be considered 'hearsay' rather than 'official'.  I
think that is why it is difficult to impossible to find out how some of
the more esoteric transactions such as stock or option purchases, sales,
short sales, etc. should actually be formatted to import correctly into
any financial program, be it Quicken or any other third party software. 
For what it may be worth, I think that Moneydance seemed to have it
figured out when I tried their software several years ago.  That is a
subscription product, and I am not endorsing it.

David C