I certainly hope the new version DOES include the tracking of sales and purchases of stocks, mutuals, etc. This is one of the aspects of Quicken 7 which allows it to mesh so beautifully with Intuit’s tax programs. Without it, why use either?

Another voice here who will pass on buying Quicken for Mac 2010 (or any other Intuit product) if you are going to dumb down investment tracking for the new Mac version. You’ve kept me waiting for a long time for the next Mac version and I am seriously anoyed that you are going to try and pass this off on us.

Just for completeness, I’ll add my voice to the chorus. Without the ability to track the cost basis of my investments, the portfolio management features you’re proposing will be useless. Sarcasm aside, please reconsider this one. Don’t take a critical function like investment portfolio management and dumb it down for the Mac version of Quicken.

Pete

My recent messae was posted with the following note from Quicken

“Your comment is awaiting moderation”

Please explain what that comment is intended to mean.

Are you suggesting that my note be changed because it makes a strong suggestion about an upcoming product?

I just posted and it didn’t appear… have I used up my allotment? 84 wanting cost basis and rate of return of their investments…
3 wanting a simple checkbook for which they use a prior quicken product.

are we the vocal minority?
where is the silent majority anxiously awaiting the latest DOWNGRADE?

At least do some customer research… give it some thought…

please respond… Thanks

Removing investment buy/sell history functionality was a very poor decision. I urge you to include this functionality in the upcoming Quicken for Mac. I’m not clear on how you could make a sound financial decision to sell a holding if you don’t have a method to track how much you paid for it. Perhaps you could include a wizard that allows you to select if you’d like to track buy/sell history or the method described in the video. This allows the user, not Intuit, to select the best method for them. I will not purchase a Quicken for Mac package if it doesn’t include buy/sell history.

Will Quicken for Mac 2010 allow one to track Canadian Mutual funds, and download banking information from Canadian financial institutions? This was a key feature for having selected Quicken 2007 for Mac up to now.

I am a very basic user for any banking software. All I want to do is register transactions per category, in 3 or 4 accounts, credits and debits. I can get all the data I need via my banks and brokerages web sites; it doesn’t need to be automatically downloaded. I used Quicken 4 for Mac for years, until Intuit quit supporting it. It was done very well and all I needed. I want a simple in home software package tuned to Mac 6.0. Come up with something simple for me, and thousands of others, and not cost an arm and a leg. You can introduce software with all the bells and whistle for folks who think they need something elaborate and expensive.

Any chance of getting on a beta list for Quicken Mac? I’m still searching for good mac software and have yet to settle into any particular package. I tried out the Financial Life beta setup last year and was sorely disappointed. I would like to try and give input on this new version.

Contrary to others on this blog, I think that QFM 2010 should be celebrated as a bold move. Consider:

1. While other companies are fighting for every customer that they can get, Quicken writes off 20% of their installed base. Not content to simply let the product wither on the vine, they actually recommend that their users move to competitors’ products.

2. While other companies engage in entertaining print and television campaigns, or innovative viral marketing and other guerilla tactics, Quicken inspires a radical word-of-mouth campaign. By angering not just long-term users, but (judging from this blog) vocal users, they ensure that their competitors will reap the publicity benefits.

3. While other companies bloat their software with new features implemented on cross-platform code bases, Quicken drops key features and enhances incompatibilities between platforms. They even publicly start from scratch (twice!), thus maximizing development activity and probably introducing new bugs.

4. While other companies are laying off employees, Quicken acquires Mint.com, adding a new development team to a years-late effort. Never has Brooks’ _The Mythical Man-Month_ been so well portrayed. (For those not in the software industry, this is the book that coined Brooks’ Law – “Adding programmers to a late project makes it later.”)

I am in awe of a company bravely fighting the fates, going against both the general economy and its own customers. Charge on, Quicken! Someday, you will be remembered with Oedipus and other heros of Greek theater. All we need to add is a chorus singing about the perils of hubris.

While I agree that most users prefer a simple interface, I strongly disagree that Mac owners do not need buy/sell information. I need to keep tabs on my investments and my brokerage. To know if my money is being properly invested, I need the buy/sell information. This information should be simple and easy for Intuit to gather. Macs are still a minority in the computing world, so I understand that those users will get less attention. However, Mac market share is growing, and the PC is shrinking. Do you want to be on the growth curve where a large majority of Mac users are begging for an upgrade, or do you want to be on the shrinking curve where most PC users already have some form of money management software and less motive to upgrade.

Generally speaking, most Mac users spend more money on their computer for a more stable platform. Why not support the crowd with more disposable income? I have had a flagship Mac for only a week and I will not go back. It is that far ahead of the PC. You need to decide if you want to keep me as a customer or lose me altogether.

This may sound personal, and I apologize if it does, but I have to question the wisdom of a firm that hires a 30-something computer programmer as Product Manager for a product that I suspect caters to the 40+ crowd. I know there are some young, affluent users out there. I am happy for you, but most are interested in tracking lifetime investments, 401k, IRA’s, Roth IRA’s, and personal property. Most 30-somethings have just begun to get their feet wet in these areas. I agree with the comments from others; hire a CPA or tax professional and have them guide the product.

Ridiculous!! I can not believe you do not have CPAs in house who can explain the importance of investment transaction details and how they are used to determine tax basis as well as tax recognition for gains and losses.

Utterly unbelievable…how do you think we are going to track tax basis for import into Turbo Tax??

Not even Intuit’s ignorance could make me unhappy with my recent transition to Mac. However, it appears I shouldn’t throw away my MS Money. At least I have that lifeline for another year or so…no way you people have this mess cleaned up by then though, NO WAY!!

Thank you for keeping THIS blog open. It appears as if you have chosen to close the other one to new posts.

A Question I continue to ask but has yet to be answered: WHY are you not including cost-basis tracking so that your customers can truly track how their individual investments’ rate of return rather than just their current value?

You say: “Our research shows customers don’t want [that level of complexity and they want it to be simple.]” Are PC users more sophisticated investors? I highly doubt that.

Anyone who has even a modicum of investment ability needs cost-basis information. Not to include it is akin to having a checkbook without knowing what your checks are. You simply have a balance.

PLEASE ANSWER THIS QUESTION: Why not include Cost basis? Do you really want to insult Mac users by insisting that they are different from PC users?

Thank you for your response… Please don’t close this blog like you did the former one.

Adriel
good news on quicen 2010 for mac. regarding the investment accounts – one of the things that I HATE about Quicken 2008 for PC is the clutter of all of the buys/sells, so I don’t consider it a bad thing that you guys will eliminate them.

HOWEVER one thing that will be critical is tracking changes over time. How do you guys plan to separate out the investment gains in the total balances from the adds/subtracts from buys/sells? Same goes for dividends that are re-invested. My family tracks not only balances, but also how we are doing, and this will be critical to us.

thanks
doug

PARITY WITH WINDOWS!

It’s been said over and over again. Please listen to us Intuit. Mac users imply want a Quicken experience no different from the feature set we used when we used Windows. That has to be the goal!

Been using Quicken on my PC for as long as it has existed. Now that I switched to a MAC, the only reason I keep my PC is to run Quicken. I can not believe how little effort has been put into the MAC version and it sound like this will continue well past 2010. Why is it that we can have so many programs that have the identical functionality on both MAC and PC, but Intuit/Quicken seem to be so out of touch with customer wants and needs. iBank is horrible, and so are all of the other offerings currently available for the MAC. Please make a version of Quicken for the MAC that has all the features currently available on the PC. All of the features. All of the features. ALL ALL ALL

Hi Jack,

Thanks for sharing the article. We’re excited to welcome Mint.com to the Intuit family as well.

Chelsea

Here is a great interview with the CEO of mint.com and he touches on the future possibilities of Quicken for the Mac.

http://www.cnet.com/8301-30976_1-10362096-10348864.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20

He will be taking over development of the Quicken desktop products and has some very interesting comments and insights.

I am going to have to stick with Quicken for Windows until these next generation programs are developed.

As a CPA, I can use complex and expensive software for my clients’ needs. For my own computing, I use a Mac because I consider it more stable and secure than Windows. And I used to recommend Quicken to my individual clients for day-to-day transaction recording, so that they wouldn’t show up on April 14 with boxes of loose papers.

Are you aware of the percentage of workers who rely on 401K and IRA investments to provide for their retirements in the absence of assured pensions? These are the MAJORITY or American workers, not a high net worth minority.

With a 401K, there is an investment buy transaction with every single paycheck. Even if it all goes into a single mutual fund or company stock, you have to account for those transactions. This is not an option; it is not something needed by only the financially sophisticated with complex investment portfolios.

I’m sorry that I will no longer be able to recommend Quicken to my clients. It used to fulfill a real need, but I guess we’ll be going back to the shoe-boxes full of transaction receipts and canceled checks.

When I converted to Mac, one of the things I had to get use to was Quicken for Mac. I had been a MS Money user and bought yearly updates for ten years without fail. I found Quicken to be useful and superior to MS Money. This is the honey. I have waited patiently for an update. This hasn’t been a problem because of the functionality of the present software. However, I will not purchase an update that has significantly less functionality than my present software, to wit, investment tracking. There you have it, I will spend money each year for more functionality, and not spend it, for less. At this point, I’d prefer you to take your time and get it right.

I just switch to Apple today. Bought my first iMac and it will likely be my first of many. I had Quicken when I ran Windows but now realize I’m about to spend $70 on Quicken 2007 and may have to spend another $70 in Feb 2010. Really? I can’t go without anything for almost 6 months.

I downloaded my last Windows version so I don’t have anything I can install for Parallels w/o buying a new Quicken version for Windows. I’m stuck. Based on the blog I don’t know what to think about QFM2010.

Does Quicken want to offer anything up for buyers of Quicken 2007 within some time span of the 2010 release? LIke a free or discounted update to 2010.

The decision to exclude investment tracking is a huge disservice to your power users but the problem has spread beyond the supposedly small subset of people who actually need and use investment tracking to the other 80% of us. This single feature, or upcoming lack thereof, is a lightning rod for the years of frustration with buggy versions of the Mac product, endless delays in shipping a new product, lack of institutional support the Mac product (yes, this is Intuit’s fault for creating a two tier sales and desktop software system) and the real (not perceived) sleight that Mac user’s financial needs are less complicated than Windows users’ needs.

100% of us don’t understand why the Quicken Mac team feels it needs to reinvent the wheel from a feature standpoint. The customer research is done, the specifications are written, you even already have a perfectly working example to follow. I never thought I’d say this but, for once, if it’s good enough for Windows, it’s good enough for us.

We don’t want illegible clover flow screens for the sake of OS X technologies, we want feature parity and online institutional parity with Windows!

So you can talk all you want about how complicated it is to come up with elegant solutions to tracking complicated financial transactions and about setting user expectations ahead of time so that we can decide whether or not the product will be right for us and about providing open and honest dialogue with your customers but what we really hear you saying is “if there was a quick and dirty way to implement such and such we would but we just aren’t interested in putting in the time or manpower required to do it properly” and “we hear you but we just don’t care”.

So hear this; “You’ve got a huge PR blunder on your hands” and “being completely undifferentiated from iBank, Moneydance or a host of free alternatives available to us we’ve already decided Quicken for Mac 2010 is wrong for us”.

Keep in mind – we won’t tolerate sloppy and woefully inadequate programs that do not meet our needs as consumers.

The part of QFM 2010 that I’m having a very difficult time understanding is why you are building a product for the Mac as if you’ve never built a Quicken product before. While the code base for Quicken for Windows is not cross platform the technical and functional design efforts that resulted in the QFW code certainly are transferrable. You’ve already figured out HOW to do investment transactions and all of the great things that QFW does. The actual coding of the specs isn’t the hard part – it’s the development of those specs. Why ignore all of your investment and experience? There are plenty of programs for the Mac that don’t look like iTunes (example: Microsoft Office Products, Adobe Products) but are well accepted by the Mac community. In the end it’s the functionality that is far more important than whether or not the application looks like Apple iTunes or iPhoto. We already have the option of using a product like iBank. What we want is something closer to Quicken for Windows that runs natively on the Mac. p.s. Do 80% of Quicken for Windows users buy Quicken Deluxe and 20% buy Quicken Premier?

I am rarely motivated to post online, and have nothing really new to add, but I want the Intuit executives, product managers and blog moderators to hear this over and over and over.

Your product decisions are alienating long time customers.
Your chosen feature set does not meet my needs.
Macintosh users do not have different financial needs than Windows users.

So, I won’t buy Quicken for Macintosh 2010, though I’ve bought every Macintosh update since 1992, as well as MacinTax and TurboTax. I’m also concerned that this will cause Intuit to further marginalize QFM because we aren’t buying it. I would actually be thrilled to pay for a full featured, modern Macintosh product. But you’ve lost me now.

“Overwhelmingly, our customers have asked for simple investment tracking.” Seriously? “I don’t want to track buys and sells, or cost basis, just let me know how much money is in my account.” Seriously? Money that goes out of (say) a checking account into the portfolio to buy new stock just goes poof? Give me a break. I don’t believe this for a second.

Maybe it is just wishful thinking (or stupidity) on my part, but I am not certain that I understand what the posts from Quicken are telling me when they say that they aren’t tracking buy and sell transactions in investment accounts.

Is Quicken stating that QFM 2010 will not download buy and sell transactions when connecting to a brokerage?

Is Quicken stating that I will not be able to manually enter buy and sell transactions and have the information retained in QFM 2010?

The former is not a real big issue for me, the later is a fatal flaw in my view.

If your users (with investments) have told you that their number one interest is in tracking their net worth, they may have assumed that transaction tracking (manually entered or otherwise) was already provided.

Regards

Matt

Chelsea – Thanks for letting us know that the “product roadmap is set” and thus confirming that there is no chance that QFM 2010 will provide any support for investments other than totals. It sounds like QFM 2010 will be something similar to Quicken Deluxe 2009 for Windows vs something closer to Quicken Premier 2009 for Windows. You probably can’t comment on future products but would QFM “Premier” be in the works? Mac users have been waiting a long time for an upgrade from QFM 2007 and QFM 2010 doesn’t sound like it is it. My fear is that the lack of functionality in QFM 2010 will result in low sales for you – which in turn will delay any additional investments in future QFM products.

I used to be in customer service. I know that as a customer, you can get further by being nice, polite, and friendly instead of screaming and shouting at the person on the other end of the line who is just doing their job. I sympathize with people who are representing their employer in a public setting and try to embody the golden rule.

In the main / original blog post announcing the delay of QFM, I stated that I was willing to give Intuit one last chance and the benefit of the doubt, and encouraged others to do the same — be patient.

But this is just too much, and the time for being nice is over. You’ve just proven that your Quicken for Mac 2010 roadmap is crap — plain and simple.

Oh
My
God

I’m not religious but that sums up my reaction to the news that Quicken for Mac 2010 will not track / record investment transactions.

Imagine if you told us we could track our checking account balance in Quicken for Mac 2010, but could not enter any deposits or withdrawals. You’d get the same reaction. Or worse.

Do you even realize how insane this decision is? Especially coming from a financial software company like Intuit?

I’m sorry, I can’t think of a better way to convey the disgust I feel right now without using foul language, but I’ll try — I am repeatedly smashing my head into my desk while espousing a stream of epithets that would make a sailor blush, all while my blood pressure rises at yet another case of Intuit completely screwing up the Mac version of Quicken.

What are you thinking? ARE you even thinking? No, really, I want to know, because this decision is so illogical, shortsighted, absurd, ridiculous, and absolutely insane that I just have to know if there are even any functioning brains in the thick skulls that apparently dominate Intuit’s employee population, at least on the Mac development team.

Without knowing how much you’ve paid for the shares in your account (which you would only know by tracking buys, sells, stock splits, dividends, etc), how can Quicken for Mac 2010 possibly claim to show you your total net worth? If I bought 1,000 shares of Ford at $2 a share, and it’s now trading at $7 per share, I know I’ve made $5,000 (not counting commissions, of course). If it’s trading at $1.50 a share, I know I’ve lost money on my investment and my net worth is down. If I received $35 in dividends, I need that information for my taxes, but it needs to be recorded in my investment account register. If a stock split, I need that information to determine my cost basis. But with Quicken for Mac 2010, I wouldn’t know any of this at all, because it will not track transactions!?!

Seriously? Again, what are you thinking?

This news alone regarding investment tracking makes Quicken for Mac 2010 an epic fail before it’s even out the door, and it proves 5 important things that every Mac user needs to know:

1) Intuit does not understand its Mac users and their needs. Intuit just does not get it. Period.
2) Despite repeated claims to the contrary and a desperate attempt to placate a majority of irate and annoyed customers, Intuit clearly IS NOT LISTENING to its customers! You basically just announced that you’ll be releasing a product that will be a huge step backwards from the already-hobbled version of Quicken 2007 and doesn’t come anywhere close to Quicken for Windows or even most Mac competitors!
3) Intuit has emphasized how data export/import is a big focus of Quicken for Mac 2010, but what use will that be if so much of the data someone recorded from their old Windows or Mac Quicken is discarded / ignored by Quicken for Mac 2010 because it can’t track investment transactions?
4) Intuit, oddly enough, as a financial software company, obviously doesn’t understand how vital transactional details are, especially to investment accounts, and how without that detail, any other data you can provide about the account is essentially meaningless and useless.
5) Quicken for Mac is dead. You’ve had 3+ years to do right by your customers, you’ve repeatedly failed spectacularly, culminating in an upcoming release of a new version that you’ve just confirmed does less than its predecessor and less than even its weakest competitors. Do you realize how insane this is? Do you realize what a giant failure this is? Do you realize how poorly this reflects on you as professionals / employees, and on your employer?

Again, what are you thinking? How can you consciously drop support for something so basic and so vitally important to a person’s Financial Life (and that was basically the former title of the product, let’s not forget) as tracking investments?

I’m just completed stunned at this news, saddened to see the death of Quicken nigh (since you seem to think people will actually buy financial software that can’t record investment transactions! Good luck with that, let me know how it works out…), and annoyed at Intuit’s long-running inept and unprofessional handling of the needs of an entire segment of its installed customer base that has led to this unfortunate moment.

Quicken for Mac — RIP

I have only read a few of the comments here, but they pretty much express my sentiments exactly. I have seen the old beta version of the new Quicken for Mac and while it looked “prettier” I think it was lacking in substance. While some of the features, cool charts, pre-packaged graphs, etc. are nice for basic users, most likely those users are not the ones that are going to spend $70 on the software. There is a huge void in the market when it comes to personal finance software for the Mac and I keep hoping someone will fill it. We need a program that can do the basic bank registers and budgeting AND provide meaningful tracking of investments, changes in net worth, and customizable reports. Apparently this is a lot to ask since nobody has been able to figure this concept out. Perhaps the programers and product managers should spend more time with personal financial planners to determine what basic reports and functionality should be incorporated. This would yield a program that could be used for “entry level” people as well as people with more advanced financial planning and accounting knowledge. Each month I take data from Quicken and create a basic financial statements, net worth, income statement, cash flow statement and changes in net worth. All the data is in Quicken, just not in a usable format. I think the programers should purchase a good personal financial planning text book and read about personal financial statements and ratios.

Back to the points already made, but I will repeat…tracking the “value” of my investments over time provides no value to me. I can do that by looking at my monthly statements or with one of the many free online investment sites. What I (and from the comments of the few here which I’m confident is only a small sample of the total population) need is a program that will track my buys and sells, dividends, etc. to provide me with the analysis needed to make decisions. Analysis that CANNOT be provided by just looking at the total value of the stock “each time you log on to Quicken.” Crazy how this basic functionality is already in Quicken and now it sounds like it is going away.

What I really want is to find a programer familiar with Mac and create my own program to fill the void and finally meet the demand that so many of us desire.

Here’s my take – Intuit is cutting Mac users off in favor of devoting resources to developing a cloud version. This is where a lot of companies want to go. It reduces costs dramatically since only a version that works with the generic browser has to be maintained and it completely eliminates support calls trying to make Quicken work on all the variations of windows and hardware.

Hi Bob,

Our goal with this communication is to let you know ahead of time what Quicken for Mac will and won’t be, helping you avoid trouble later if the product won’t meet your needs.

Chelsea

I’m also disappointed that the new version won’t track buys and sells on my various brokerage accounts. I have also been a Quicken user on both PC and MAC for over 15 years. I also use Turbo Tax. Frankly, I think the PC version has more then I will ever need, but Buy/Sell is still important in a streamlined version.

I’m not understanding the rationale for not supporting buy/sell transactions. When we download updates from our financial institutions very likely there will be changes – and not just in share prices. For example, additional investments are made into 401k plans, brokerage accounts get a additional cash shares to reflect interest, dividend are added to accounts etc. So when we download transactions and the share quantity is different what will happen? Will you include an “add shares” or “remove shares” or just show the new quantities and leave it up to the user to figure out what the changes were? If you extend the same kind of reasoning you are using for investments to the banking side why bother to include payments and deposits? This is basic stuff that’s been in your products for years! If you can’t get investment tracking to work for a Feb 2010 release then maybe you should delay the release date until you can provide the needed functionality. The Mac community has waited years for a version of Quicken that provides the equivalent functionality of the Windows version so what’s a few more months? A “new” product with an updated interface but less functionality than the challenged Quicken Mac 2007 version is really missing the boat.

After seeing the video and realizing that Intuit is not trying to stay in business any longer, I will not be coming back to this site to even check on the progress of Quicken 2010. You obviously do not want my business so I will grant you that desire. When support for Q-for-W 2009 is stopped I will be seeking a non-intuit solution.

How hard would it have been to just bring Quicken 2009 over to the Mac? You are apparently trying to fail on this or you would not trying to reinvent the wheel and this time make it square.

Instead you treat us (Mac users) so poorly, and assume we want less functionality? Why in the world would I not want to know when, and for what amount stock purchases and sales are made? Way to go Intuit you lost yet one more 10+ year customer because you just will not do things the smart way.

I used Quicken on my PC and had good experiences. Now, the MAC version does not update automatically. The update does not load. Why cannot you make a program that works and keeps working. Good PC experience, unacceptable MAC experience.

When I switched to Mac and saw the lack of functionality Quicken had in its Mac version, I bought Parallels to continue using Quicken. (I’ve been a Quicken user since 1989.) When I install Snow Leopard I will have to upgrade Parallels. Before I found this blog, I was hoping to dump Parallels and switch to Quicken for Mac. Now I see that’s not an option for me. My decision now is whether to go with the Parallels upgrade or find another financial package to run on the Mac. I’m kind of tired of Parallels…

I too am a long time PC user and a 2+ year user of the Mac ‘07 version. I have reluctantly accepted the reduced feature set in the Mac version so as tot have to deal with MS Windows on my Mac – the very reason I went to the Mac in the first place.

My question is, if CrossOver Mac truly does work (stability, reliability, etc.) with Quicken, then why doesn’t Intuit spend the time and investment dollars working a deal with codewaevers (the makers of CrossOver Mac) to incorporate CrossOver Mac into a Mac Premier Version that is the same as the PC version. The trick would be not having the Mac user have to install CrossOver Mac, but rather be integrated into the Mac Quicken program itself. They could save developments costs by not having to maintain and develop both a PC version and a Mac version (a task they are obviously not capable of accomplishing very well per comments from their customer base). I believe most Mac Quicken power users would accept and embrace the PC user interface – if it gave them all the same features the PC version possesses.

Well, Intuit? How ’bout it!

Intuit, please consider this option…

I am CONVINCED that Quicken is in bed with Microsoft! I love Quicken for Windows – but hate windows PC’s. So, like every other big company out there (Adobe, Microsoft, etc.) why doesn’t Intuit create the same version of Quicken for Mac?

I loaded my mac with Quicken 07… It’s utter crap. The windows are all separate, the data couldn’t be converted from my Windows backups, the program itself is unstable. It’s CRAP!

Everyone who worked on Quicken Mac 07 should be fired!

What is so f’n hard about giving regular Quicken functionality to mac users? Why is the Windows version standardized, relaiable, easy to use, and functional, yet the Mac version which sucks is now getting the equivalent of a downgrade in 2010???!!!!

Wake the hell up people… Intuit is not very intuitive! This revision for mac is not only taking painfully long… (do you have 5th graders coding your software?) But for what this new version is expected to do… You could code it in a week!

Garbage, junk, crap! Get the windows version on the mac asap!

Three years between updates for MAC users is unacceptable! Quicken 2007 for MAC is buggy, your 3rd World Nation phone support team is ridiculously inept and after 15 years as a customer, Intuit has lost me!

I have been using Quicken for 15 years. Two years ago went to Quicken for Mac 2007 and continue to have reliability problems. Program crashes when I try to upload/download from financial institution. I have reinstalled program, loaded new certificates, loaded patches, but still crashes. Sure hope Quicken for Mac 2010 addresses reliability issues.

This is a deal breaker for me. I can’t imagine why you would take functionality away from the program, especially something so key to a financial program as the ability to enter buy and sell transactions for investements.

I need to ba able to manually enter my investment information, I do not want to dowloand it from the brokerage, I want to control myself what I put in Quicken. I have to be able to see my lots and select those I am seeling and have proper reporting for doing my taxes. The whole reason I use Quicken is to track data for doing my taxes. Sure dowload from a brokerage should be an available option but it shouldn’t be a requirement.

A less important issue is I also don’t want the program to automatically update prices every time I open it. That will slow down opening the program. Also, I don’t always want to see the updated value of my portfolio. Auto update of prices should be an option that I can turn off and choose to select download of prices the way I do now.

The Intuit development team is competely off base on this. As another poster pointed out the point of using software is for the software to perform complex tasks. I can perform simple tasks myself without spending money on your software. I can’t believe that a single user has actually requested Intuit remove complexity from Quicken. When your customers said they need to understand the value of their investments they meant they need to see all the detail of their investments including buys and sells. Product Manager, you have really screwed up big time.

We can’t count on support for Quicken ‘07 to continue indefinitely. You’re really opening the door for a competitor to come in and take away your customers.

I have been using Intuit products as long as I can remember, both Turbo Tax and Quicken. I just purchased my first Macbook Pro.

I was planning on getting Quicken for Mac. However I am glad I found this web site. It seems I will either have to get Quicken 2007 for Mac or Stick with a Windows version. Seeing my purpose for buying a Mac was to get away from Windows, I will have to look at an on line financial program or hope some one else makes one for Mac..

From what I have read now, this Qicken 2010 for Mac is nothing more than a fancy check book for 20 somethings with no investments.

It sure will not help for Finacail planning if I can not track cost bais for investments or use it for Tax planning and prepairing my Taxes.

From what I can read and see, 2010 sure is not an upgrade or improvement. It seems to loose the purpose of a financial program.

I keep reading the Intuit peoples post on how this is better for most users. I have yet to read one consumers post on how it is better. Where are the posts by conumers who feel this is better or what they want?

James, you may be right that Intuit figures those who want Quicken WIndows features will just use that program with Boot Camp or Parallels or whatever, so they needn’t bother to spend the money to develop those features on the Mac side. But if you are right, what Intuit is missing is that Mac users don’t like having to keep Windows on their machines and maintain a second operating system. If Intuit doesn’t come up with a viable, full-featured Mac product at some point, someone will–there are certainly a lot of companies working toward that goal. And when that happens, a lot of people will jump ship. Meanwhile, the Mac user base is growing fast. It was recently reported that 90% of sales of computers costing over $1,000 are Macs. And guess which users are precisely the ones who are going to want financial software with advanced features. Hint: It’s not the people buying $400 Windows machines.

The obvious argument here is that if tracking buy’s and sell’s is a supported feature for the Windows version, why would Intuit think Mac users wouldn’t want it in their package? And they think we should be satisfied with the “reduction of complexity” argument? It’s pretty insulting really.

On the issue of “not to track investment buys and sells” : I consider this to be a terrible mistake and a complete show stopper for me. This seems to also be the case for many others that have commented in this blog.

The best way to track how well your investments are doing is to use the internal rate of return (IRR) which my current Mac Quicken 2005 does perfectly well. This can give an annualized rate of return for each investment, even if buys and sells are made during the period. How on Earth can total amounts tell you anything about true performance and help you track how well things are going? I can have a great investment with an IRR of 15% that loses $4000 in total value simply because I sold $7000 after recognizing that it was doing so well. Total amounts are of course useful, but are not a good tool for performance tracking. Performance is all about the percentage yield that an investment returns, with IRR being the best way to determine yield.

There is another critical aspect of personal finance that requires tracking of buys and sells. The IRS requires everyone who sells an investment to give the cost basis, i.e. how much did it cost to buy everything that you are selling? If Quicken does not track buys and sells, it is impossible to determine the cost basis from Quicken records, something I do every year. Like many others, I enter this information in manually knowing that when I sell something 5 years from now, I have a complete record of the date, number of shares, and cost for a basis calculation. Each year, I simply set up a custom report and have what I need.

I started computer tracking my finances with a checking account program that I wrote in BASIC, on a TRS-80, abandoned it for Managing Your Money on our first Mac, and then moved to Quicken because it could perform IRR calculations, among many other features that I find very useful. I currently have 10 MB of Quicken financial history going back to 1993 and have upgraded virtually every time that Quicken provided a useful update. I have been waiting for an upgrade to an Intel Mac for some time. If this shortsighted failure to include a feature that you have had since the beginning of the Mac version of Quicken happens, I will look elsewhere for a product that can.

Scott

Read Dave’s comment earlier today and read it again and then again.

I won’t need QFM if I won’t be able to track investments.
I can use Yahoo’s Portfolio website to do more than you propose and it is free. Checking account software are dime a dozen.

Come to the party and produce a product people will buy.

I have no need for Windows so going that route to get a decent Quicken doesn’t make sense to me and many others.

You will come out with a product that will fail in the marketplace.

Does the name “Edsel” ring a bell.

I’ll keep using QFM 2006 as long as it is supported. No new sales there.

Like the other comments I can’t believe that you are going to release Quicken for Mac 2010 without support for investment transactions. I’ll have to keep using Quicken for Windows under Fusion where the necessary functionality exists. If you’re going to have a Mac product, make it better than the Windows version or at least follow Firefox’ example and make them equivalent.

So, if not tracking investments is what your customers really want, how come none of them are here expressing their excitement on the news?

Like the others, I think this is a horrible decision and it will keep me on the Windows version of Quicken. Could you not have the option to either track investment transactions or simply update holdings without keeping details? It seems like these do not have to be mutually exclusive software features.

I predict Intuit is going to experience a very high rate of return (that is, many people are going to return their purchase for a refund) on the new Quicken for Mac.

I have not commented here before but feel compelled to do so.

Feature parity with the Windows version is where you START … not something you fail to do. Has no one on this project ever studied marketing? … Has no one ever heard the phrase “exceed your customers expectations”? Well, you are not only not exceeding expectations; Intuit is not even meeting them.

Tracking security buys and sells is Finance 101 and I am amazed that the folks developing this product don’t get that.

You guys are getting absolutely creamed on this – why doesn’t anyone on the team address this point?

I too am writing for the first time and can not believe you are removing investment functioanality. This is a big step backwards. There is now way this is an upgrade.

“Because it has taken us so long to update theac product, we won’t be discontinuing support for them when 2010 is released.
Thanks,
Scott”

Scott, What do you mean by this? Intuit’s “sunset” policy has already removed the ability to download fund prices from my Quicken Mac 2006 (not to mention my Quicken Windows 2006). Are you going to restore that capability?

WHEN will I be able to use Quicken with Snow Leopard?!!

Jeff:

Because it has taken us so long to update theac product, we won’t be discontinuing support for them when 2010 is released.

Thanks,
Scott

“Rest assured your Quicken 2007 will work just fine. We’re not discontinuing support for it.”

Thanks for stating this, Scott. It’s just that my Quicken 2007 hasn’t been working ‘just fine’ because Intuit has pulled the link between the application and Quicken.com. As a result I can no longer benefit from having a current snapshot of my investments. I can’t even manually edit my online accounts, so that data is over a year old and stagnant.

With that said, I am still comforted, somewhat, that you say QFM 2007 will be supported.

Dear Quicken,
I understand the desire to make things simple. I can believe that many people find the tracking of buys/sells and such to be overkill and the “snapshot” to be desirable. That said, this is a bad move. Quicken should offer flexibilty not restrictions. If people want this as a “view”, fine, but don’t strip out what is core functionality. I was just trying to explain this to my 15 year old – I told her that when she goes to the ATM she can get a balance and a printout of the last 5 or 10 transactions, but that in this new program, only the balance could be checked. Even she understood why this is a bad idea! My daughter thinks you need to get your brains checked.

Give investors flexibility and choices not iron chains. You WILL lose customers over this!

Scott – - – I am still confused and can’t believe you are removing such an important feature in QFM 2007 as investment transactions. You say: “The fact is, based on usage of the functionality (pulling in this information into your software through the connectivity), it’s a relatively small number.”

What do you mean by “connectivity”? You do not have to pull buy/sell data in to offer transaction details. I enter all my buy/sells manually. As QFM updates the price, it figures cost and current balance/returns out.

Is it possible that QFM 2010 will not pull transaction data from investment firms, but will allow us to manually enter the information (I am hoping)? I could live with this.

Can you please send update on when Quicken for Mac will be available?? I’ve used Quicken for PC for 8 years, Quicken for Mac for 3 years….and need an intel based Quicken for Mac…or try something else. Thanks, Sam Keith

I do not know Mr. Gulbransen but he should not be bothering to post to this blog. He continually says that Quicken is not for you and just wants you to know so you can go away. Then why not just drop the product as Microsoft did with Money? If Intuit is not making any money on the product then just stop. We will be upset, just as we are now with the yet to be released product. But we will find alternatives to Quicken and Turbotax and then Intuit will not have to fund those products.

Larry:

Rest assured your Quicken 2007 will work just fine. We’re not discontinuing support for it.

Thanks,
Scott

I just received an email from Todd Stanley announcing the merger with Mint.com and promising ‘you’ll get the same level of great service you have come to expect from Quicken.”

Ahem,… I’ve been a Quicken for Mac customer since Adriel was in diapers. I’ve seen support for the Mac drop to nothing since last year. I did some research on Mint.com and their online product…. it does not appeal to me at all. If I were a 20-something with tons of debt and average income, then I might find appeal in this type of program with its emphasis on budgeting. Still, who in their right mind would risk their financial logon info to an upstart web company?

My Quicken financial file is the one of the most important files I have. I’ve invested countless hours maintaining it, not to mention over $700 in fees to Intuit. I upgraded my Mac to Leopard when I heard from Intuit that Financial Life for Mac would require it. I actually believed they would deliver; but I was wrong. I also believed they would fix Portfolio Export to work with Quicken.com. Another broken promise.

If I am accurate at reading the writing on the wall, then I will be forced to migrate to the Windows version of Quicken. That is painful, but then maybe I’ll get some of the ‘great service’ that Stanley proclaims.

Scott,

Unlike others I am not going to argue with you about why Intuit has decided to drop support of investments in Quicken for Mac. You’re in business and you doubtless need to get a new release out and I respect that decision. I might disagree, but it is your business.

But, Intuit sold me Quicken for Mac 2007 (as well as all older versions going back to 1998) and as part of that release, investments were supported.

So, what happens to me? Will quotes continue to work, or will I be cut off once we reach the sunset point?

I think the answer here is important. It is also important as a way for Intuit to (re)establish a tone with the Mac community.

Matt:

Thanks for the thoughtful response.

The fact is it’s not just going to be a “facelift”. The product will work better and perform better for a vast majority of new and returning Mac customers. It appears it will lack what you need. For that, I am sorry.

Again, that’s why we’re here telling you as many details as possible. That way you can make the most informed purchase decision you can.

Thanks,
Scott

I want to add another dimension to the discussion. Most of us do not stay with a broker or bank all our lives so being able to carry the transactional history (and Basis) for investments throughout our financial lives is critical. As we change jobs our 401K’s transition to new institutions. With no transactional history all will be lost with a change of an institution. Also, today’s savvy investor and money manager moves money from broker to bank and vice versa routinely. Without the ability to track all types of transactions your Mac software will be useless. How can your CEO look Steve Jobs in the eye at Apple board meetings?

John:

Thanks for your post. As you can imagine, both the folks at Mint and at Quicken are excited that we’ll soon be joining forces. Only good things will come from the union.

Thanks,
Scott

Scott, I’ve been a user of Quicken Windows for as long as I can remember. It was a very full-featured program from the early days and, every year, I’ve received mailings from Intuit that touted must-have new features that ostensibly made an upgrade compelling. This year, for example, Intuit is talking about a new Investing Portfolio that “gives you a 360° view across all of your investments…Define goals, set targets, and perform thorough analysis of your 401(k), stock investments, and mutual funds with advanced tools and investing reports.” My question: If Intuit thinks these are the sorts of features Quicken Windows users want, why on earth are we being told that the “vast majority” of Mac users want only a basic program with no advanced investment-tracking features? What makes us different? I’d appreciate your thoughts on this.

I’ll echo the comments of others by saying that Quicken without the investment features needed to do my taxes makes it worthless.

I don’t need feature parity with Windows but as a software developer myself, I have to agree with John who said: “the underlying non-GUI financial engine and data libraries should share a common code base across platforms (Mac/Windows/whatever). Then you only need to recreate the front end GUI for each platform.” Why are you reinventing the wheel … badly?

The management chain guiding this project should be put out to pasture before you end up with a product that no one buys.

I just stumbled on this video. WTF? This means that QfM-2010 will not track transactions if they are investments. Since reconciling those transactions with my other registers and accounts is one of the “features” of QfM I am losing great functionality.

The video mentions that you can track investments over time, but that will be fragile without a transaction database to rebuild from. Think of the problems with corruption of that history data and how hard it will be to rebuild it.

Check register programs are a dime a dozen out there. What are you now selling that is unique?

I don’t know how you decided that only 20% of your customers use the investment feature. Can you really discard 20% of your user base that casually. I assume that only 10% of your user base is Mac anyway so I think I understand where you are going with this logic.

This is the first time I have ever posted a comment on a corporate blog…..but I can’t believe that Quicken for Mac won’t track buys and sells. How will I determine the cost basis of my holdings? I have been waiting for over a year waiting for this to come out, but after seeing this video update, I will just go get something else.

This is why I have never purchased any financial software for the Mac. The few software packages out there all make it ’stupid proof’ and look pretty, and it looks like Quicken for Mac is going in the same direction. Basic users are not the only people who use Macs!

I would like to see support for multiple currencies and smartphone syncing (syncing daily transaction from multiple smartphones) in this version of Quicken for Mac.

Hi Kevin,

We will provide additional videos and screen shots as we move along. Stay tuned, hope you’ll check it out.

Chelsea

I agree with Bryan and everyone who has pointed out that the lack of any tracking of the actual value of an investment makes the proposed solution all but useless. It would be equivalent of providing the amount of money in a checking account on Thursday without knowing how much was in the bank on Wednesday.

This design decision shows a lack of understanding of your customer base. The 20% you have chosen to ignore, you are missing the very people who will actually buy this product instead of using mint or quicken.com.

Ben

I am having a hard time understanding the video. You talk about knowing the value of your investments. How do you know value if you don’t know the cost basis of the investment? For example, if a buy 10 units at $1 and today’s price is $.25, I have essentially lost 75% of the VALUE of my money. If I take what the video is saying, I will not be able to track the VALUE of my investments. Please tell me I am wrong. There are less expensive and mostly free programs that can manage only bank accounts and simplistic forms of investing. We are relying on Quicken to be smarter than the other guys. You will seriously lose market share without this feature. Delay it another month if you have too. Please track the transactional data of investments. Without it, you are just like the others.

The decision to exclude transaction-level investment tracking from Quicken 2010 is not only a huge mistake, as Matt commented. It is also tantamount to a broken commitment by Intuit VP and Quicken GM, Todd Stanley, who welcomed abandoned Money Plus customers in an online letter, stating reassuringly how “Quicken will help Money customers migrate their data to Quicken.” This reminds me of those television commercials where a kid is playing with a toy truck, then a banker grabs it away from him, saying “time’s up” and hands him a cardboard cutout, while pointing out the fine print on the bottom of the real toy. The kid protests, “This is junk.” As a long-time Money user, and a recent Apple convert, I had already been looking for a full-functionality replacement for Money Plus for several months when Microsoft® made the discontinuation announcement. I took Quicken’s commitment on good faith and quit searching for another alternative. Now, disappointed by Intuit’s decision to offer a useless cardboard cutout in lieu of a serious, full-function personal financial software product, I will resume the search for yet another alternative. Mr. Stanley, please don’t write checks your software developers can’t cash.

Not to pile on, but as a Quicken user from day one, one of the product’s most compelling areas of evolution has been around investments. Buy/sell tracking, cost basis tracking and the minutiae of tax compliance are critical to any investor. If Intuit decides to strip such functionality, then it will no longer be a serious or compelling product for a broad class of users: average investors. Please don’t make the classic mistake of dumbing down a product in the belief you are increasing its appeal, when in truth you are just making it a less powerful tool.

Chelsea , the support manually update button took me to unknowingly to windows Quicken and R5 upgrade to see if I was current . When I found I was R2 then I was Mac current . Then I needed a search for 2007 Mac manually update certificate . I found it with little difficulty . I was able to download from my brokerage house after that . BRYCE

Hi Chelsea , with a little stumbling around I finally found the Mac Quicken Certificate updater.dmg and reconnected to my brokerage house . Thanks Bryce

Chelsea , Quicken is the only financial software I have had going back ? 15 + years guessing . I have been waiting since last year for a quicken update . The performance has been slowing down . I would be good to get this solved . I am sure you are aware of that . Without Quicken working by the end of the year tracking money matters will be difficult . Bryce

This is a joke – it just confirms that Intuit isn’t interested in what loyal users actually want, and instead will just try and justify dropping useful features by claiming “80% of users” are satisfied with the limited functionality they are providing. If so, why aren’t they also dropping the same functions from Windows versions? It can’t be that Mac users are financially more simplistic, can it?

Ridiculous, totally ridiculous. If Intuit also drops support and kills downloading of quotes for Quicken 2007, it’ll just be a complete rip-off.

I have run into the same OL-249 problem Quicken 2007 no longer connects online to my brokerage house . I am very disappointed . If I cannot solve this soon I will have to look somewhere else for other software to do this .

I’m not excited about the lack of investment tracking. I’m not a sophisticated investor and even I don’t see how the new Quicken Mac will be usable for investments.

However, here’s another problem: Quicken 2006 just stopped doing any online communication!

I Googled and found out Intuit set up a security certificate updater for 2005, 2006, and 2007 versions that’s supposed to fix the OL-249 problem. I had to run One Step Update twice before it worked, but it worked!

Thank you to Intuit for getting at least one thing right and not totally killing off our obsolete software! Here’s the link:
https://quicken.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/quicken.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=7368

I’m glad to see that Intuit is listening to its customers. Sort of. I tried the Financial Life for Mac Beta last spring. After loading and converting my data, my impression was similar to everyone else – “What a piece of .. useless software. At least Intuit has had the good sense to try again. In the mean time, how about continuing work on the 2007 product.
I see that there is a recommendation that the lead on this project should resign. I think that person should be fired, AND the person who approved this ridiculous product as well.
This product isn’t suitable for anyone beyond the fifth grade. Why not rename it Quicken for Fifth Graders? If this seems like such a great tool for the Macintosh community, why deprive the Windows community from its benefits? The next version for Windows should be similarly ‘featured’.
Bottom line, Intuit, is give us a product worthy of our needs. Apple has spent much time and effort to convert Windows users, and you offer this shoddy product. This is exactly why Apple lost market share in the past. Software vendors produced unsophisticated products and the market perception become that Apple/Macintosh was not a ’serious’ platform.
Thank you, Intuit, for this opportunity to vent. I hope you really understand your market, otherwise you will cease to be in the market.

After a frustrating weekend trying to figure out why my transactions would no longer download in Mac Quicken 2007, I discovered that I needed to apply a certificate update to replace the outdated certificates in what is now three year old software.

How many Mac Quicken customers will drop Quicken in frustration after deciding that Snow Leopard was the culprit that “broke” their software?

I cant believe that Quicken 2010 will not track buys and sells. That decision makes the product totally useless for me and I would predict a majority of users. You will lose many customers if you dont implement these basic functionalities. Intuit, read your blog and listen to your customers, dont just take the easy path to a marginally useful product.

A financial transaction software package that can’t track financial transactions (i.e., buy, sell, and reinvest information of various instruments) is of no use.

Since older Mac versions of Quicken indeed allowed people to find their net worth by typing “Command-A” or running a “Net Worth” report, I’m confused by your claim that you’re now specially focusing on this ‘feature’.

I guess the only hope is to update to Q2007 before you pull it, and then wait until Intuit comes to its senses, or a competitor takes advantage of this strange lapse to come up with good software that I will gladly purchase.

I am really disappointed on the progress of this product and what I see. The interface looks nice, but way too simple and a lot of elements being left out or being was too simplified. Just copy the current version of quicken for windows. I would also like to see a version of quicken for mac incorporated into quickbooks for mac so I can manage my business and household finances in one program.
The lead on this project needs to resign,
Sorry, does not look promising. Get with it Intuit. Mac is taking market share and if there was a good version of quicken I think it would take even more market share from windows.

Hi David,

We’re recommending Inner Circle for customers with lots of ideas because that is our official forum for collecting those ideas and making them acitonable – but to answer your question, yes, product managers and others at the company do read the blog comments you make. They visit Inner Circle and Live Community even more regularly though. Ideas are easier to see in aggregated on Inner Circle than they are in blog comments. It’s a practicality thing – not harm intended. If you’re passionate (lots of Mac customers are, which is awesome), we want you to join us there to help improve our products if you’re willing.

Chelsea

i’ve been using quicken for macintosh since in 1993. i’ve stayed with it for all of these years NOT because i’ve loved quicken so much but because there really hasn’t been a better product.

i’ve weathered the years of apparent neglect, the promise turned debacle that was going to be QFLM, i was encouraged when you announced a mostly ‘blank sheet of paper’ rewrite of quicken. i believed you when you said that you ‘got it’ when users were telling you what we wanted (did you actually notice how many times ‘feature parity with windows’ was mentioned????)

now you proudly put out a video telling us how q2010 is going to track investments without tracking buys & sells??? all i that think to say is WHAT THE HECK IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE????

as already mentioned, no buy & sell info= no tax basis=no way to prepare investment info for tax returns= useless.

are you actually TRYING to drive people AWAY from your product?

civil society and failings of the english language prevent me from fully expressing my utter disgust with the path you seem to seem to be pursuing.

Thanks John.

They don’t share a common code base as of today.

We’re being fully transparent on what the product will and won’t be. We’re having the discussion now so customers can make the choice best for them far before release of the product.

Thanks again,
Scott

Scot:

For the 20% of customers who use the functionality your talking about, we agree, the new product won’t deliver what you need it to.

As Adriel said, this version is focused on the basic functionality the vast majority of customers and new users want. We’re giving those like you, with more complex needs, ample notice ao that if you need to find another solution, you have time to do so.

Thanks,
Scott

Ted:

read earlier posts for this answer.

Thanks

Why is it taking 3 years for a new version of Quicken for Mac?

You seriously think that people don’t care about the cost basis of their investments? What about feature parity with quicken for PC does intuit not understand?

The other major thing I’d need to do with my investments is track the cost basis. Is there some way to do that without tracking buy and sell transactions?