[GNC] QIF Import Fails

Sat Apr 6 02:39:19 EDT 2019

Art,

I offered a simple definition of retained earnings in a previous reply. Did you not see that message?

Anyhow,

A simple test would verify a bug or (inadvertent) user-error.

Delete the imported transactions. (all copies)

Then try the import again and this time, paying extra careful attention to the assigned accounts (changing 99.5% to 100%) proceed with the import. Screenshot everything if you are so inclined...

If you STILL end up with those transactions assigned to an account OTHER than the one you very clearly specified, then yes, you have found a bug and then the task is to source the cause of the bug. (I never did see a reply on the apparent space character from the QIF file in the date field possibly being an issue)

While there are many known issues and bugs with any software, this one included, no one wants to start chasing a non-bug.

(I’m guilty many times of thinking something is a bug that wasn’t)

So please, indulge us a careful and methodical re-import, at least with one test transaction, for completeness sake and report back, if you don’t mind, and have the time. It will aide in narrowing down the issue (if any) and hopefully identify the cause, which will lead to quicker resolution.

It is very possible that importing *only* one or more offending transactions will more than likely narrow down the exact issue. (one at a time is the best approach)

Regards,
Adrien

> On Apr 5, 2019, at 9:39 AM, Art Chimes <arts.online at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> David, In the course of numerous import activities I reassigned many
> transactions from the defaults suggested by the import tool. However,
> I am 99.5 percent certain I never assigned a transaction to "Retained
> Earnings," and I found dozens of transactions incorrectly assigned to
> that account. I am also very (but somewhat less) confident that none
> of the proposed matches was presented by default as "Retained
> Earnings." I know very little about accounting -- what constitutes
> "retained earnings" is still a mystery -- and even less about coding,
> but it seems to me that, with all respect to those who contributed to
> the code, the import function is at least quirky.
> 
> Again, thanks to you and the rest of the GnuCash community for your help,
> Art (a noobie making baby GnuSteps...)
> 
> On Fri, Apr 5, 2019 at 10:04 AM David Carlson
> <david.carlson.417 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> Art,
>> 
>> You have the opportunity during the import process to review the proposed "category" assignments and make corrections at the match transactions step.
>> This is where you fix those incorrect imports.
>> 
>> If you start with a select few small imports the Bayesian matching feature will get a chance to make most of those corrections for you.   It is not perfect, so you need to monitor it carefully.
>> 
>> Good luck
>> 
>> David Carlson
>> 
>> 
>> On Fri, Apr 5, 2019, 2:57 AM Art Chimes <arts.online at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Thanks for the troubleshooting suggestions. Adrien pointed out the
>>> ability to filter register displays, for which I am thankful. As a new
>>> user, I hadn't discovered that tool yet.
>>> 
>>> He also suggested searching to see if the transaction ended up
>>> imported into some other account. Which is exactly what happened.
>>> Instead of going into the checking account where it was supposed to
>>> go, this transaction -- and many others I thought I had failed to
>>> import -- ended up in "Equity:Retained Earnings." I suspect "retained
>>> earnings" has some specific accounting definition, but I don't know
>>> what it is or what transactions actually belong in that account. I do
>>> know that it was not my intention to put those transactions in that
>>> account, and I am pretty sure I did not assign any transactions to
>>> that account in the import process.
>>> 
>>> In 2009, a user filed a bug report in Bugzilla on just this behavior.
>>> (https://bugs.gnucash.org/show_bug.cgi?id=603761). Another user
>>> replied to the bug report, "The importer is assuming these are opening
>>> balance transactions. Could you explain why this type of transaction
>>> is legitimate for some other purpose?" My transaction involved a bank
>>> account interest payment. (In Quicken there is no separate income
>>> account so the bank account has an interest payment that appears as if
>>> by magic; it can be credited to the account or transferred to another
>>> account.)
>>> 
>>> I can manually move these transactions, one-by-one, to where they
>>> should be. But going forward, do I just have to resign myself to a lot
>>> of QIF editing? Since I imagine that a lot of QIF importer users are
>>> migrating from Quicken, perhaps some Quicken-specific warnings or
>>> something could be considered?
>>> 
>>> Thanks again,
>>> Art
>>> 
>>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>> 
>>>> Message: 1
>>>> Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2019 11:25:00 -0500
>>>> From: Adrien Monteleone <adrien.monteleone at lusfiber.net>
>>>> To: Gnucash Users <gnucash-user at gnucash.org>
>>>> Subject: Re: [GNC] QIF Import Fails
>>>> Message-ID: <FE5D5ACC-C7DA-46BF-86F5-1E128D7C36E6 at lusfiber.net>
>>>> Content-Type: text/plain;       charset=utf-8
>>>> 
>>>> Any time I?m in a pickle and can?t see a transaction that should be there, I check that the register is not set to a filtered view. The transaction might be hidden for some reason. I also check one of the registers for the other accounts involved in the transaction.
>>>> 
>>>> There is also a very powerful Find feature that you can even use regex with to find it.
>>>> 
>>>> Regards,
>>>> Adrien
>>>> 
>>>>> On Apr 3, 2019, at 9:16 PM, Art Chimes <arts.online at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>> !Type:Bank
>>>>> D7/ 1/97
>>>>> U5.32
>>>>> T5.32
>>>>> CX
>>>>> PInterest Earned
>>>>> L_IntInc
>>>>> ^
>>>>> 
>>>>> Above is an example of a transaction that is failing to import. The
>>>>> QIF export is from Quicken 2000 via Windows.
>>>>> 
>>>>> I've had problems with imports before, but eventually figured out the
>>>>> problem. This one has me stymied. I  successfully imported
>>>>> transactions from 1998-present, but the older ones aren't cooperating.
>>>>> 
>>>>> The importer process seems to work ok, concluding with the encouraging
>>>>> notice, "QIF Import Completed" However, the transaction does not
>>>>> appear in the account register.
>>>>> 
>>>>> One possible clue: I get a screen that asks me to match this
>>>>> transaction with one of two others that have the same
>>>>> date/amount/payee, even though the transaction doesn't appear in the
>>>>> account.
>>>>> 
>>>>> This is actually one of numerous exports from the same Quicken file.
>>>>> Some work; others don't, and my troubleshooting hasn't gotten me
>>>>> anywhere. From the "about" screen: Version: 3.4; Build ID: 3.4+
>>>>> (2018-12-30)
>>>>> 
>>>>> Thanks to the community for your help!
>>>>> 
>>>>> Art