Bank account balance incorrect after import from Quicken

Liz edodd at billiau.net
Fri Sep 4 02:27:41 EDT 2015


On Thu, 03 Sep 2015 08:45:57 -0400
Mike or Penny Novack <mpnovack at mtdata.com> wrote:

> On 9/2/2015 10:03 PM, Tom Allred wrote:
> > Okay, I'm out.  Repeating the circumstances over and over and still
> > getting speculation as what actions on my part created this
> > situation are just not useful.  There was no place in the automated
> > import process for me to intervene, enter balances, approve
> > specific transactions, etc.  I got the same result whether I
> > created the database complete from scratch with the import or
> > whether I created a shell new database with no amounts or balances
> > entered.  I started the import, it ran, I checked the results and
> > gnucash had COMPLETELY ON IT'S OWN created the reversing opening
> > balance transaction which, as I've ALREADY said, was exactly the
> > same (same date, same descriptor, same balancing account, same
> > amount) except that it was a withdrawal instead of a deposit.  I'd
> > delete the transaction and any others like it, hope it doesn't mess
> > up any reconciliations, and if gnucash decides to make any future
> > "helpful" transactions on it's own I'll just trash it and more on
> > to something that handles accounting in a more traditional way.
> > Peace out, Tom
> 
> Tom,
>      GnuCash does appear to handle accounting in the traditional way. 
> Your problem is something else, related to the import of data, and 
> without knowing if this data represented the data of an IN BALANCE
> set of books there is no way even I (decades of experience debugging 
> financial systems) could begin to try to find out what went wrong.
> I'll repeat, this is an export-import problem so you shouldn't jump
> to the conclusion that there is something wrong with gnucash.
> 
>      Let's take this from the top and consider the data being
> imported. You were trying to import ALL the data from another
> bookkeeping application, yes? Well THAT set of books presumably also
> had its own opening transaction. Is THAT showing up? Also, when
> moving data like this you normally want to show everything checks
> out. For example, that the Balance Sheets match. When you run a
> Balance Sheet report for the old system (immediately before the
> export) and then one for gnucash after this import, what do you see?
> << I think when you have reported this to us we will be in a better
> position to figure out your problem >>
> 
> Michael


I think that we need some docs about importing
I know someone is doing some work on the docs, but people do confuse
the QIF importer with Gnucash.
Persons leaving Quicken only leave once, and there are a number of
suggestions, including not importing but running parallel over a time
period (eg one accounting period).

Although the last gentleman was sure he knew all about accounting, he
was not understanding that Quicken is not a double-entry accounting
program but has a double-entry veneer (or it did when I used it, which
also started over 20 years ago).

It is difficult to help those who insist that they are right, and we
are wrong, but when our philosophies differ, both may be right!

Now I'm sure, like Derek says "patches welcome", new documentation is
welcome too.

Liz


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