Re: problem with a repeating payment

On Wednesday, July 19, 2023 at 10:45:40 AM UTC-5, Bernie Cosell wrote:
> John Pollard  wrote:
> } On Saturday, July 8, 2023 at 2:43:33?PM UTC-5, Bernie Cosell wrote: 

> } When posting problems such as this one: you should include the financial institution name 
> } (as found on the Display tab of the Edit Account Details dialog for the Quicken account); 
> } and the "Connection Method" (found on the Online Services tab of the same dialog). 
> } In order to have the ability to send online billpay instructions from Quicken to the billpayer, 
> } the Quicken account must use the "Direct Connect" connection method.

> Ah Wells-Fargo, and direct connect

> } Personally I have never found any use for Quicken "Repeating Online Payments". 
> } They provide only one small benefit 
> } (the ability to create a repeating online payment by 
> } sending the instruction to do so from Quicken); 
> } it's a one-time benefit, often offset by the inability to change the payment characteristics 
> } without deleting the Repeating Online payment, then re-creating/re-sending it.

> I use it for several things. For example, I make monthly contributions to 
> the local animal shelter. 

> Since it happens *every* month it is a real convenience 
> to have Q automatically poke W-F to make it happen. 

Quicken doesn't "poke W-F to make it happen": once the repeating 
online payment is setup at W-F, W-F will automatically make that 
payment on the schedule you specified. That's what the "repeating" 
part of the process refers to.

> Absent that machinery I'm not quite sure how I'd manage to be 
> responsible enough to make the payments by-hand on my own.

But my point was (is) that a Quicken "repeating online payment" only provides a 
trivial one time benefit: it lets you create (setup) the repeating online payment from Quicken. 
Once the repeating online payment has been created at the financial institution, 
the Quicken "repeating online payment" does nothing that you could not do without 
the  Quicken "repeating online payment".  As I described in the next paragraph:

> } Once the repeating online payment has been setup in Quicken, 
> } and at the financial institution; 
> } the Quicken repeating online payment is of no real use; 
> } a regular Quicken (non-online) repeating payment will do the exact same thing.

> I'm not sure how to sort those out: it's setting it up in quicken and I 
> think it implicitly used my attached bank account to effect it. How do I 
> set these things up at my bank.? 

All online bill payments are controlled at the financial institution, 
(at the bill payer's web site).  Any online payment you can setup in 
Quicken can be setup at the billpayer's web site - without using Quicken. 

> I'm not sure what "the exact same thing" means.. 

The "exact same thing" means that once the repeating online payment 
is manually setup by you at the billpayer's web site, it will function exactly 
like the "repeating online payment" that Quicken creates.

You can, and probably should create a plain non-online repeating payment 
in Quicken's "Manage Bill & Income Reminders".  
You can have that Reminder entered in your Quicken register before the 
actual cleared payment is downloaded, making sure that when you Accept 
the downloaded transaction, it matches the entered Reminder.

> The way it was working 
> was that about three days before the end of the month the repeating 
> payments would magically appear in my register, with a date of the first of 
> the next month, and then they'd just get sent.

> } Without knowing what your underlying problem is; 
> } my best guess for how to address the problem is to: 
> } - delete the Quicken repeating online payment, 
> } - do an update (OSU or Update Now) with the billpay financial institution 
> } (to syncronize Quicken and the billpayer) 
> } - re-setup the repeating payment at the billpayer's web site 
> } - create a regular Quicken non-online repeating payment transaction 
> } with the desired characteristics

> I'll contact W-F. I'm not sure I can have them directly make 
> repeating payments. 

If you can't do it manually, you couldn't do it via Quicken. 
It's the bill payer who offers the "repeating" bill pay feature; 
Quicken just sends the same instruction that a human would 
when manually creating a bill payment at the bill payer's web site.

Remember, there are people who don't use Quicken, 
who are paying bills through their financial institutions. 
They also need the ability to schedule repeating bill payments 
(such as rent, for example). so there must be a way to do that 
without using Quicken.

> If so then it is all OK -- the payments will show up in my 
> register after OSU and all will be well

Yes, they will.
Once a bill payment has been made, and has cleared your 
financial institution (your bill payer), it will be just like any other 
payment transaction that clears your financial institution.