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qif2qfx Convert | Help

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Contents

QIF2QFX Convert

Getting Started

QIF2QFX Convert is a single step financial data translator to convert QIF files into QFX format suitable for Quicken® software from QIF files. Use QIF2QFX Convert to import transaction data into Quicken Essentials for Mac or Quicken for Windows when you are only able to download QIF format from your bank or create it from another financial application.

To get started first set your Quicken account information and date formats with the Settings button. It is important to select an FID. If your bank or brokerage is not listed, then it is not supported by Quicken, and you need to select the FID of some other bank as a workaround. See more about FID's below.

Then either drag and drop your QIF file into the converter drop zone or select the Convert button to choose a file to convert. This will bring up a standard file chooser. Navigate to the folder containing your .qif file, select the file, and then select the Convert to qfx button at the bottom of the file chooser. This will run the converter and create your .qfx file in a single step. The .qfx file will be created in the same folder as the .qif file, and using the same file name but with a .qfx extension.

Import the .qfx file directly into Quicken simply by selecting the Import button. Or read the .qfx file from within Quicken using File, File Import, Web Connect File. Do NOT try to read as a Quicken Transfer File (.qxf) which is something else entirely.

Installation

  • Microsoft Windows® full install
    • Download QIF2QFX.exe for Windows, save the file to your computer, and run the installation program by double clicking the file.
    • If you do not have have Java installed it will be automatically downloaded during the installation.
  • Mac OS X® full install
    • Download QIF2QFX.dmg for Mac OS X, save the file to your computer. Locate the file in the download area, open it by double clicking, then and run the installer.app by double clicking it.
    • If you do not have have Java installed it will be automatically downloaded during the installation.

Entering License Information

Enter the license by copying the license string (CTRL-C) from the confirmation e-mail and pasting it (CTRL-V) into the converter license dialog. To enter the license string manually from within the program select the License button, and paste (or type) the full license code into the dialog.

On Microsoft Windows, you can copy the license file qif2qfx.lic from the product confirmation e-mail to the same folder where you installed QIF2QFX Convert - i.e. C:\Program Files (x86)\MoneyThumb\qif2qfx Convert.

After you enter your license, your license email will be shown in the program title bar, and in Help, About.

Preparation

There are two things to do before running QIF2QFX Convert:

  1. Create a QIF file. Most of the time this will be downloaded from a bank site, or perhaps created by another software application.
  1. Get the account number of the Quicken account into which you want to import transactions. If you are creating a new account, then any number will suffice. If you wish to import transactions into an existing account, then Quicken will match up the account numbers, and you will want to import into the correct account.

Running QIF2QFX Convert

On Windows or Mac OS X, double click the QIF2QFX Convert icon on your desktop.

You may also run QIF2QFX Convert from the Windows Start Menu, or run QIF2QFX.exe on Windows or QIF2QFX Convert.app on Mac OS X.

Settings Dialog

Use the Settings button to bring up the Settings Wizard or the full Settings dialog. The Wizard will ask questions that cover the vast majority of conversions. The Settings Dialog also contains a few additional options. You can switch back and forth between the Wizard and the full dialog.

qif2qfx Convert Settings

Setting Quicken Account Info

First use the Account Type pull-down menu to select the correct type for the .qfx file - Bank, Credit Card, or Investment. In addition there are four pieces of account information that may be inserted into the QFX file when it is created. The only one of these that is critical is the Quicken FID. This is a four or five digit number that Quicken uses to identify the financial institution. Quicken will validate the FID over the Internet when reading in the QFX file, and it must be correct and valid, or Quicken will abort the file import.

Select "Lookup..." in the dialog and it will bring up a window with all the Quicken Financial Institutions that are listed for that type of account. Type some or all of the name of your financial institution into the search box at the top to search within the list. Scroll down the list to find your bank and select it. The bank URL is also included to help resolve ambiguity if your bank has a name that is similar to other banks.

If your bank or brokerage is not listed, then Quicken will not import QFX Format files (Web Connect files) that are identified as being from that financial institution. The only workaround is to use an FID from some other bank. You can still name the account to include the name of your financial institution. So long as you as not also doing Quicken Direct Connect downloads into the same account, it will work just fine. There are some Financial Institutions that provide Direct Connect, but do not support Web Connect, and if you use one of these, you will have to create two accounts and move transactions from one to the other.

Just remember that the FID is critical, and although QIF2QFX Convert will run without one, it will give a warning, and Quicken will give an error when reading the QFX file.

QFX files are required to have account information. All files require an account number and bank accounts also require a bank routing number. If you don't want to save your accounts numbers for security reasons, then you can skip entering this this information. If you do provide your account number to be inserted into the QFX file, then Quicken uses that number to automatically determine which account to import into. If you are always importing into the same account, then QIF2QFX Convert will save the information from session to session, so you do not have to re-enter it. For PayPal users, your account number is the email address you use to sign into PayPal. Note that QIF2QFX Convert does not access the Internet at all, so any information entered is only saved on your computer, and is not sent over other web or to any other computers.

To determine the account number to use in the QFX file, QIF2QFX Convert will look in the following locations, in order.

      1. Values from the Settings dialog window (see above). Once again, if you are concerned about entering your account number, then don't, and either manually edit the QFX file after it is created, or match up accounts when doing the Quicken import.
      2. The QIF file name, if it is a number without any letters.
      3. As a last resort, QIF2QFX Convert will use an arbitrary default number for the routing number and account number. You will then have to manually match accounts when reading the QFX file into Quicken.

The bank account routing number is required by QFX for bank accounts (but not for credit cards or investment accounts). However, it is not actually used by Quicken, so if you don't specify one, QIF2QFX Convert will insert a default value and Quicken will accept it.

Lastly, the currency needs to be specified. US Dollars are the initial setting, use the drop down to select a different currency.

Date Formats

QIF2QFX Convert can read dates either in US format (month-day-year) or European format (day-month-year). Use the Settings dialog to select the date format that is used in your QIF file. If your dates have the month name or abbreviation rather than a number, then this setting is not applicable. Note that there is no need to specify a date format for QFX files.



Splitting QIF transactions

When reading QIF files such as those from PayPal that split the transaction, you can choose to have each split made into its own transaction. Select the option for Separate splits in output transactions. For PayPal this allows you to have one transaction that is the received payment amount, and another transaction that is the transaction fee. If the transaction is not split, such a transaction will be imported as a single transaction with the net amount.

Converting the QIF File to QFX

There are two ways to identify the QIF file to convert:

  1. Select the file in your operating system file browser (Windows Explorer, Mac Finder), and then drag it into the converter "Drop Zone"

or

  1. Select the Convert button in QIF2QFX Convert to bring up the file chooser and select the file to convert.

QIF2QFX Convert will run, giving some statistics on how many lines were processed and create a .qfx file with the same name. If a .qfx file with that name already exists you will be prompted to overwrite it.

All of the data in a QIF file will be converted directly into the .qfx file. You can verify the transactions in the QIF2QFX Convert log.

Importing QFX files into Quicken

The easiest way to import the QFX file is simply to select the Import button, which will cause open the file in Quicken. Alternatively you can double-click the QFX file when viewed in Windows Explorer or Max OS X Finder. Another method is to read the QFX file while running Quicken. Select File, then from the pull-down menu select File Import, and then Web Connect File... This will bring up the standard File Open dialog, select the file, and then select Open. The transactions should be read into Quicken. Do NOT try to read the QFX file as a Quicken Transfer File (.QXF) which is something else entirely.

Troubleshooting


Your bank is not present in the list of FID's.

The list of FID's (Financial Institution ID's) actually comes from your Quicken install, and is the list of banks that have paid to be included as a Quicken supported bank. A bank may be supported for checking accounts, credit cards, investment accounts, or any combination thereof. Similarly a bank may be supported for Direct or WebConnect downloads, or both. And the list is country specific. If your bank chose not to be included, then it will not be in the FID list and Quicken will not import transactions using that bank name. It has nothing to do with QIF2QFX Convert. However, there is a very simple workaround which is to use the FID of some other Financial Institution. You can use pretty much any other FID you want. You should probably choose one that is not a bank you have other accounts at, is a large bank that is unlikely to drop Quicken support, and has a name that is similar to or that you can associate with your bank name.

QIF2QFX Convert Error: No QIF Type found, unable to process

If the QIF2QFX Convert log windows has the error: "No QIF Type found, unable to process", then verify that the QIF file starts with a valid account type definition. The first line should be something like !Type:Bank, !Type:CCard or !Type:Invst.

Quicken Error: "Quicken is currently unable to verify the financial institution for this download. Please try again later."

When you import the QFX file into Quicken, if you receive an error "Quicken is currently unable to verify the financial institution for this download. Please try again later." then the FID is incorrect. Quicken is very picky about this. The financial institution must be currently in good standing with Quicken for Web Connect download, and the account must be of the correct type. Quicken distinguishes between financial institutions that support investment accounts versus those that support bank and credit card transactions.

QIF2QFX Convert will only display those FID's that are listed as being able to import Web Connect files of the account type you selected. If you don't see your bank or brokerage, Quicken will not accept Web Connect files from that financial institution. Quicken tends to have different names for banks and brokerages at the same financial institution and if your financial institution does not support web connect for the type of account you are trying to import, then even though you choose a bank with the same name as your brokerage, you will get the error listed above when trying to import into Quicken. Also, even though a bank may be listed, Quicken may still give this error. That problem seems mostly to occur with small banks, perhaps they did not stay current with Quicken.

If you are running into a brick wall with Quicken FID's, one workaround is to use an FID for some other financial institution other than the one you actually use. However, if you already are downloading from your financial institution, then you would have to have two accounts and copy transactions from one to the other. Therefore, this is practical only if you don't already download directly from that financial institutional, or you import transactions very infrequently.

If Quicken is refusing to link a QFX import to an existing account, then make sure that the account type was set correctly - see the section above on Setting Quicken Account Info. Quicken will only allow you to import credit card QFX files to credit cards accounts, bank account QFX files to bank accounts, and so forth. If the account number was not specified accurately in the Quicken Account Info, then Quicken will generally allow you to do a manual match, but it will also change the account number in Quicken.


No transactions visible in Quicken when you import the QFX file

The most common reason for this is that you need to accept the transactions into the Quicken account register. In Quicken, go to the account register, select the Downloaded Transactions tab at the bottom of the register, and accept the transactions.

Multiple Accounts in a singe file

Because a QFX file can only contain transactions from a single financial institution, QIF2QFX Convert will only process the first account found in a QIF file when creating a QFX file. However, QIF2QFX Convert will process a QIF file containing both a security list and an investment account, merging that into a single QFX file.

Saving the QIF2QFX Convert Log

After QIF2QFX Convert has run, you may wish to save the log information to a file. Select the Save Log button. This will bring up a File Save dialog. Simply specify a file name and select Save.

To clear the log information select the Clear Log button.

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