Quicken 2016 for Windows Review – Manage Bills in One Location

Anyone who is thinking of purchasing Quicken…or any Intuit product……needs to think twice. The software is the greatest UNTIL YOU HAVE A PROBLEM OR NEED TO CONTACT SUPPORT and I promise, you will need some level of support for this inferior product.

In my case, I have been a Quicken user for more than 15 years but I am replacing it and will never use it again as the quality of the product has steadily declined with each new version. Their support staff is among the worst in any business and it is no surprise that they are selling out…….they cannot run this business.

In the past 5 days I have spent more than 6 hours on the phone with incompetent people trying to fix, what appears to be a very basic problem with the Quicken password.After the 3rd hour, I asked for a supervisor. The supervisor could not fix the problem but was kind enough to offer a call-back “with a higher level of support”…….3 days later.In the meantime, I had to use my banks online billpay to pay my bills.

Well, I took off from work for a 2nd day and the call never came…predictable. In another 2 hour call the problem was still not resolved. And guess what……NO FOLLOW UP CALL CAME AND NO ONE AT QUICKEN CARES THAT I CANNOT USE THEIR USELESS SOFTWARE…..BY THE WAY, THEY ARE STILL CHARGING MY ACCOUNT FOR THEIR INEPT SERVICE.

TAKE THIS WARNING: DO NOT EVEN THINK OF BUYING THIS CRAP. THERE ARE PLENTY OF OTHER PRODUCTS OUT THERE. THERE ARE OTHER ONLINE COMMENTS ABOUT QUICKEN THAT EVERYONE SHOULD READ BEFORE GETTING TRAPPED.

John in Jersey.

Long-time user of Quicken — over 20 years — and version 16 download/install on 11/24 created a disaster.

I have used Quicken since 1992. I have multiple accounts both checking and investment. It is also where I keep a list and history of my assets. I can not imagine my life without Quicken.

I was preparing for heart surgery two years ago and upgraded from Q Premier 2013 to Q Premier 2014. It was full of bugs. It almost killed me coupled with the surgery. I promised I would never upgrade again until the end of the cycle. I waited until November 2015 to go to Q 15. It was too late to get Q 15 so I had to get Q 16. I reluctantly loaded Q 16 Premier and after the transfer it indicated my password was
wrong and I could not open it. The tech told me to use password hook to remove
password…. Real mistake. I always back up my Quicken so I uninstalled Q 16 and
reinstalled Q 14. THANK GOD IT WORKED GREAT!

I can not imagine my life without Quicken. When it is working properly you can not beat it. I have multiple homes with computers and my financial world travels with me on a thumb drive. Wonderful when working properly.

My suggestion is to perfect what they have and stop making changes. Charge an annual license fee and have free tech support included with license fee. Stop adding features but keep making what you have more reliable. I CAN’T IMAGINE LIFE WITHOUT QUICKEN…. Do not screw it up!

I have been an accountant for over 40 years. I have used Quicken since the mid 1980’s. The thing is, I don’t like any connection to online tracking. Not bank, credit cards, or investments. I like strictly off line accounting.
I have enough issues with setting up a new credit card, etc. without going on line. Will the 2016 version make this harder?

I can see why they want to sell quicken after they came out with the 2016 version. It is by far the worst program on the market and they will have a 0 base return customer list of those who bought 2016 and anyone who pays more than 5 cents for this program is getting screwed. I have not seen any reviews anywhere of anyone who likes the new Quicken. I just hope they reveal whoever is stupid enough to buy quicken from intuit so I can avoid buying their products.

I have been using the Quicken and Quickbooks since the DOS days when the product actually worked and they actually had support. With each new version forced upon the users in order to continue downloading transactions, the product gets worse. None of the issues I have experienced with “new and improved” versions have been fixed. The latest 25.1.4.14 release is probably the worse. This is the last version I will purchase. I spend more time now than ever fixing thing that download improperly. I’m done. Intuit, you have ruined a once good product that was easy to use.

Oh my! I just converted from the 2014 version to the 2016 version. I had my doubts when I converted to my 2014 version because I had some issues. Then one day the 2014 version stopped accepting specific symbols in the passwords.

OK, so I believe in giving Quicken another chance and what happens when I upgrade to the 2016 version. You guessed it. More problems.

First one of my bank accounts which was reconciled and showed cleared items did not show the items that were clear in the previous version. Customer support suggestion – reconcile it manually.
Great help.

Second one of my credit cards could not download transactions. The message I kept getting was that it was a Quicken problem on the server and to try in a few hours. A few hours pass and now I get a great message – “A connection to your financial institution could not be established. Try again in a few days.” A few days? Who are they kidding!!!!!!!

The same problem exists in the 2016 version as it did in the 2014 version. The 2016 version still does not accept specific symbols. I set up the password on the banks internet site and can log into the account. But when I use the same password on Quicken I get a message that my financial institution does not accept the password. What?

Trying to get help from the customer support people is useless. To solve the credit card problem, it was suggested I get a new credit card account from the institution since Quicken no longer supported the rewards program. Dumb get dumber.

Now I can understand if these were some off the wall financial institutions, but Wells Fargo and Chase. That says it all.

My recommendation is stay far far far away from the Quicken 2016 version. Do not even think of upgrading as it is useless and one big headache.

Long time 2010 Premier user, generally satisfied with it. Just upgraded to 2016 Premier… big mistake. On Win 10, CD installer screwed up my screen background then installed software. Don’t have Intuit ID or password so clicked on ‘Create One’; enter one screen of info., enter second screen of info., click ‘Next’ and get error that something is wrong with my network!!?? WTF? I have browser windows open in FireFox and Chrome, no issues there! Okay, go to handy ‘Quick Answers’ card and try URL for installing help; goes to Quicken home page (useless). Try other URL’s on card, they all go to same useless home page… are you kidding me? Three more attempts to create a Intuit ID & pw fail w/same stupid message. That’s it, Windows uninstall and the 2016 Quicken crap is history. I will be reinstalling 2010 Premier.

Mr. Ludwig’s review of Quicken 2016 is very helpful indeed. I’ve used Quicken since the late 1980’s and now have over 25 years of expense and investment data. I agree it’s the most comprehensive personal finance package on the market. Over the years, I’ve been annoyed like many users with the fact that Quicken doesn’t make many changes to their program each year. I can think of things they could do to liven up or brighten the presentation (use of colors) in their program, add standard reports, and the ability to customize reports. I purchased an downloaded Quicken Premier 2016 and had nothing but problems. First, as I recall, I had to enter the program via my Quicken.com account (I’ve never had this happen before) and all hell broke loose. For some reason, Quicken wouldn’t accept my existing member/User ID and password, made me change it, and then all I got was “Oops, an error has occurred. Please try later” messages when trying to access the program. So I uninstalled 2016 and went back to Quicken 2015. Not without problems, by the way, but I finally got 2015 running again and I’m so afraid to try 2016 (for the reasons above) I think I’ll just stick with it. It’s good to know the new bill paying feature is free, however. I could upgrade to 2016, use this feature, and stop paying the $9.95 per month on Quicken Bill Pay. That savings will in itself pay for the upgrade to the new edition.

Quicken 2013 connected services to be discontinued …no more downloads of transactions and balances. Evidently Quicken cleverly routes financial data requests through its servers rather than the user downloading directly into the program from the financial institution. So with one snap of the fingers Quicken forces you to buy Q2016. Major screwing of this long-time user.

This also greatly enhances the selling value of Quicken as users can be forced into annual upgrades.

I too have used Quicken for over 20 years and depend on it for everything financial in my world. I usually upgrade every three years. However, this year I was going to wait to see if some of the bugs could be worked out. Then I got a message that said if I didn’t upgrade, I could no longer download bank transactions. I cannot afford to upgrade to Deluxe this year. So, I called and talked to a rep who told me that Quicken Starter would actually work for what I used it for and didn’t need to get Deluxe. PLUS, they gave me a nice discount. I took the bait and downloaded 2016 instead of moving over to Moneydance. I spent 2 full days just downloading my accounts to bring them current and to balance all of them. Everything seemed to be ok. Backed up and closed the program. Opened the next day and tried to download my transactions and nothing will download. Program says its because of a bank error. Called my bank. They have done ZERO updates to online banking. Nothing on their end should have affected downloading my transactions. Contacted Quicken CHAT. Was told that I needed to send in my data and they would review. Got an email 3 days later that it was escalated to their Scripts team. 16 days later I’m still sitting here with no updates, no resolution. After sitting by my computer for an hour waiting for a new CHAT session, I’m told that I just need to wait for the Scripts team. In addition to all this, nothing was ever said about how I would no longer have the ability to even VIEW my past Quicken information with the Starter Version. All my years of financial records can no longer be viewed — even though I am still using their product! THIS IS ABSOLUTELY RIDICULOUS!!! No updates, you chat with a person who can’t even answer a simple question. Now, I’m sitting here with a piece of software that is not currently working for me. HOURS of work put into getting it all current and the inability to look at my old information. How long do I wait for a resolution? I’m so disappointed since I had so many years of a great product.

John Mastrosimone’s, below comments, parrot exactly what me and my husband have experienced. We have spent hours (probably easily 20 hrs.) on the phone waiting for Tech Support to try to coordinate our passwords which got completely confused during the installation of Quicken Deluxe 2016, with no positive result.

This is a very very bad program that I regret having purchased!!!

I, like the author, am a long time user of Quicken. I’ve gone back and forth between Mac and Windows with no issues. I just recently went back to Windows and I absolutely HATE this new version of Quicken. I am a digital User Experience professional for my company. This version is the worst User Experience I’ve ever seen. Features that would think are so simple, simply do not work. Sorting – when I open the application, my accounts will just decide to sort however they feel like – newest transaction to oldest or oldest to newest. I never know what I’m going to get. When you reconcile and need to enter a new transaction from that window, you click on New. It takes you to the register but to the OLDEST transaction. You cannot scroll through transactions using your mouse, you have either use the scroll bar on the side or click through each one. And don’t get me started on Bill Reminders – I might blow a gasket. I’ll be looking for a new application.

i would like to get my money back for this software. how can i even contact quicken?

Quicken Windows 2016 is an unforgiving piece of crap. I have been trying unsuccessfully to open the program. I have been using the product for 20 years and have numerous username and passwords over that time period. I have been unsuccessful getting help on the phone or by following instructions. I would be better served by ledger paper. Their drive to protect a user makes it impossible for me to log in.

This is disappointing news but not surprising. I recently had an awful experience with Quicken Bill Pay which ended with me cancelling that service. So now I save $10 per month and pay my bills for free through my Ally Bank. It just means I have to do a little extra work to record them in Quicken 2015 instead of entering and paying them in one program. The new version doesn’t sound worth the money to upgrade and risk new bugs. 2015 works and I think that I can continue to use it for a long time. Perhaps once I retire in 5 years I’ll have the time to sit and adapt to a new program and re-enter my data that I still need. And I can always move it to a laptop or Windows tablet when I retire my desktop.

I too have been a long-time user of Quicken. I think version 2, even back to Apple IIc if I recall correctly.

What would have been helpful, is a listing of all the things that broke when forced to go to Quicken 2015, and whether they’re fixed in 2016. Keyboard shortcuts stopped working (focus), a known issue that for some reason in this day & age Intuit can’t even figure out how the windows interface and went backwards instead of forwards by introducing glitches and bugs. But I agree whole-heartedly that their releases have been less than revolutionary. The lack of innovation in this space has been outweighed by bugs, leaving a long-timer a bit underwhelmed. I am nervously optimistic that the product is up for sale. Maybe Microsoft will get back into this space and buy it, given the lack of competition.

Unless I’m missing something, my only two font choices in Quicken 2016 are tiny or gigantic. I can’t read the former, and the latter is so big that windows and menus appear well outside of the screen. Hate this feature. If anyone knows a work-around, I’d be glad to hear it. I don’t want to change font size in my other programs, so don’t want to make a global change in my settings.

Thanks, Larry, for your comments. I too, have used Quicken for decades. However I’m not a power user, and it very much annoys me that I can’t upgrade from 2014 to 2016 Starter Edition. I really don’t need anything more, so why pay more than double, especially now that you’ve revealed that Quicken is not long for this world, at least with Intuit. I’d do it if I could, but apparently Intuit has already made the decision to abandon their client base. What a sad way to end the life of a really great product.

I thought your review was ok. It would have been nice to know how your many years of quicken data made it through the conversion from 2015 to 2016 (even 2014-2015). I’ve been a quicken user since 1995. Converting from 2014 to 2015 was the worse year for me. I ended losing a lot of category data. The needing of a password was a really bad thing for me. I’ve been looking for a software that will do the same thing as quicken but haven’t found it yet. I’m not sure I will update 2015 rev 8 to rev 9, not to mention 2016.
It didn’t surprise me to hear intuit is trying to sell quicken. I hope they do and I also hope it will be a company that will want to stick with it for the long haul.

I’ve used Quicken for many years-at least 2 triennial cycles, now on Q2014. It is nearly perfect as a checkbook. It has been problematic from the beginning in tracking investments, and every iteration is worse. The current version does stock splits incorrectly, screws up spinoff distributions, and every once in while “recalculates historical prices” in a way that falsifies current balances. (There is more). Given the comments about problems with upgrading to 2015 and 2016, I shall from now on keep the checkbook-budgeting-expense part, rely solely on downloading investments from my brokers, and look forward to a new vendor when Intuit abandons Quicken.

I have used Quicken for decades. Aside from all the history I have on it, the main feature that keeps me with Q is being able to download credit card transactions, most of which get classified automatically. Are there other financial programs which do this?

Thanks for taking the time to write about Quicken. I too have used Quicken since the 1990s, as well as Microsoft Money. I have not upgraded since the 2012 version of Quicken. I also love to use Microsoft products. My 2012 is installed in a Windows 8.1 laptop (without a touch screen). Since then, I have been using Windows 8.1 on a Windows Surface Pro, which I love.
I am willing to pay for an update, but want to be able to simply import my data, and use it on my Windows Phone and the Surface. I wouldn’t think this would be hard to do. UNTIL NOW.
I am also willing to purchase a new program from a different company, as long as I can print out categorized reports as in the past, and there is some type of conversion mechanism so all my years of input won’t be wasted. Knowing my current situation, what program do you recommend? I think $30 is reasonable for my simple needs.
Thanks for any insight you can lend.

Thanks, Larry. A couple of questions.

I’ve been a user of Home & Business 2013 since, well, 2013. 🙂 Think it’s time to/worth it to update to 2016 now?

Given Intuit’s direction/path with Quicken, do we need to be concerned about financial institutions potentially stopping support for downloading transactions into Quicken, or is it just far too popular for that to be a possibility?

Larry
Thanks for the review. Does Personal Capital have the same register control that Quicken has? Are you able to manage your cash flow out into the future by place holding future cash needs. What is Personal Capital’s reputation with bill paying directly from the software to the bank?
Thanks for your help.

There is no mention in your review on Quicken 2016 if you do no want to interact with banks. Is there a way to avoid Step 4 in the Quicken process as it relates to Login Bank Information?

I have decided to stay with Quicken 2015 and expect that other than paying my bills through my online bank instead of inside Quicken. I have seen a comment suggesting I wont be able to download transactions from my bank automatically in to Quicken at some point. Is that accurate? All downloads of bank accounts and my Vanguard accounts continue to work presently.

I downloaded Quicken 2016. All went well until it came time to register the program. That fell flat.
After reinstalling a couple of times and still not being able to register, I decided to call it a day. There was a 55 minute wait time on Quickens help desk.

I am getting a refund from Intuit, possibly tomorrow.

I still run Microsoft Money and have liked it more than Quicken from the start. I knew Money might not be able to be installed at some point and that is the only reason I ever put Quicken on my laptops.

Since Intuit requires you to download from your bank using their web site in some way, what will that do to that function when/if Quicken gets sold?

Not my idea of a program I want to keep.

Quicken 2016 is by far the worst program they have come up with if it is suppose to be compatible with Windows 10. I would give it a 1 star compared to the quicken 2007 I had before. The print is so big and the columns are so screwed up it makes it hard to navigate the program and there is no way to adjust it. I have found several suggestions on the internet, but none of them worked and from some of the complaints it sounds like you have to pay a fee for customer service to help you. If I ever need to buy another financial program again, it won’t be Quicken. I only bought the newer version because I built a new computer and put Windows 10 on it so I thought I would upgrade my Quicken while I was at it. Once you upgrade, you can’t go back. I even copied my data in another file thinking I could go back if I wanted to. Quicken 2016 found all my data files and changed them. I guess I should have copied them on a different flash drive. I’ve been using Quicken for over 20 yrs and there has been very little change in it until now and they haven’t been good ones. I would go more into detail but I’m getting tired of venting.

I do not know as to where you obtained your info on. I have been a Quicken user for the better part of 20 years. I have the 2013 version currently, I did however ‘download’ and install the 2016 version. Wow! What pile of crap! Nothing but bugs. Their claim that all that is fixed. That is a lie beyond even reasonable logic. I finally gave up trying and uninstalled 2016 and reinstalled 2013 and obtained a refund. That was the only thing that went smoothly. Where it is so magical that the Quicken software will famously do everything for you is bunk. There is no way that is possible in part because there are oodles of financial institutions that each use security steps that Quicken does not function with. Look, bill pay can be easily handled and dealt with much more so without Quicken. This idea that all can be smoothly all directed thru Quicken software is bologna.

Good article. I’m considering Q 2016, as I just received the blackmail note from Intuit telling me that connected services will be cut off unless I send them $65.

I was a happy Microsoft Money user until that was dumped (Can’t understand why MS didn’t sell it to someone…)

I’m stuck with Quicken, as I will NEVER use a “cloud” product, where I must enter all of my bank and brokerage passwords into an online site, where I may someday learn of a “hack” that gave away all of my financial passwords.

I’ve been using Quicken since version 4.0 and use it for every type of account. I have been using Quicken Premier 2016 for about a month, trying to get used to it. It’s not working. I absolutely despise this version and will be reverting to a previous version. When changing from one account to another the screens bounce around like a bad website. Some short-cut keys sometimes work, but usually don’t. My budget reports show the Budget amounts and the grand total for the Actual amounts, but all the individual lines in the Actual column display as 0. If I click on the line item, then it displays the actual transactions for that line. What an absolute waste of money. Stay away from this product.

Failed to access accounts. Won’t work with any browser other than IE. Customer support is virtually non-existent but did give a helpful reply of “That’s a known problem and you have to enter your accounts manually”.

Don’t buy this software. It’s a bigger waste of money than playing the lottery.

I enjoyed your article on Quicken Alternatives, I’ve been using Quicken since 1991…. when the printouts were made on a dot matrix printer. Over the years, the upgrades never appealed, as the original program did everything I needed. Eventually, but I gave in and bought the 2004 version. I used the 2004 version for seven years, and it worked fine until sometime in 2012, when it forgot how to add. Not a good thing for a program used for balancing a checkbook. I went online to Quicken’s “Community” and the folks there thought the problem was that I had so many entries that the capacity of the Quicken data base was exceeded.
I bought Quicken 2013, but due to some medical issues and computer hardware issues, I didn’t get to install it. I was about to when I read your article about 2016 being the last version of Quicken under current management. I’ll probably continue with 2013 for now (unless there are some fatal errors in 2013.) and buy 2016 later in the year.

I have a question before I upgrade. I too am a long time user of Quicken and I love it (better than Quickbooks actually)

My question is this. I do a one step update every day to grab all the transactions from my various accounts and download them into my register. Lately I’ve had a major problem with this. I don’t know if it’s Quicken or Wells Fargo the bank I’m having trouble with. It doesn’t recognize my accounts. Or rather, it stopped recognizing my accounts – this after a number of years of no problems.

I would upgrade to 2016 if that version fixed it. But it’s not mentioned anywhere. Has the one-step update improved?

Or do you think this is a bank problem, and is anyone else having this issue?

I had the same problem before upgrade. I had to deactivate and re-activate the account in question to get it to work.i have not had the problem since upgrade to 2026

After repeatedly entering transactions missed in downloads; deactivating and reactivating downloading for accounts; encountering too many connectivity issues: enduring bugs in Quicken updates; and enduring long, unproductive sessions with customer support, I have abandoned Quicken. When Quicken 2015 Deluxe promisised to fix such problems, I upgraded my 2013 version. It was worse; I took a refund and restored my 2013 version.

I opened an account with Mint last night and within 15 mninutes I was up and running with my 13 banking, credit card and investment accounts. I have had no problem downloading transactions from my credit union which Quicken failed to do sucessfully about 10% of the time. For me, Mint is a vastly superior product; I can’t believe both are Intuit products.

A pretty balanced review, thanks. I’ve used Quicken for 20 years or so and customer service has never been worse. I didn’t realize it was being sold so I guess that explains the horrible level of “free” support for Quicken 2016. Quicken 2016 does not add much value to previous versions since the added features often will not work – especially the linking of billing accounts. In the Quicken Community group, Quicken says it is working aggressively to fix these problems (especially with banks and credit cards). Search for Chase Visa to see examples. But if you’ve paid for the newest version, that’s not much consolation. I’ll be switching over to one of the other packages recommended in this review, so thanks for the help.

Stay far away from Quicken 2016 if you want to keep your sanity. You can not always update your transactions from your financial institutions because it stops working for no reason. But, it says that your financial institutions site is down. However, you go to your financial institutions site and it works. It is the Quicken service that is down, but they blame everyone else. T

The other issue is that Intuit releases the product too soon and without the proper testing. Result – lots of bugs that the consumer has to work with and/or around. with little help from Intuit.

Customer service – well since they out source the service, there is none. The reps have no idea what they are talking about.

Rating Quicken 2016 on a scale of zero to ten – how good are you at fractions!

Now that it’s tax time I found out that I cannot even print a report with Quicken 2016. I wish I could go back to my old quicken but I lost the disk and have turned the house upside down trying to find it.

So my option is to keep my 2013 and manually input all the transactions from now on? They tell me that feature is going away in March., but I see on here that the new program causes more issues than that.

With the March download cut-off looming I reluctantly bought Q16 to upgrade my Q13. I have had no problems so far on a Windows 10 HP Desktop. It is a tad disconcerting to know that all of your data downloads and uploads go through Quicken servers. But it is what it is and I can not exist without downloading credit cards and bank accounts.

Don’t be fooled. People are bailing from Quicken in droves..I’m one of them. After 17 years of using Q, I am switching to Sage because of Q’s poor service and inept support people. I am through with the 2-3 hours support calls that do not resolve the problem. Q is for sale for a reason.

So I’m looking for a simple checkbook and tracking program that can download from my bank. Quicken 2013 has done that well. Now Intuit is forcing me to upgrade to maintain the connectivity to my bank. Everything I read here paints disaster coming if I do.
Would love to not have to manually enter every check /debit transaction and track expenses by category…..is Sage or Mint a viable option? I don’t do my investments or credit cards in the program now.

You may want to see who owns Mint.

What is recommended for personal + business then? WaveApp is online but doesn’t do what Quicken does. Is there anything comparable?

For me, the 2016 release is finally forcing me to migrate. The primary advantage of a tool like Quicken is that it gives me an offline view of my transactions from many sources. While 2015 started to sync my data to a web view (that I will never use), in 2016 it requires me to sync every time I use it. i tried to look at some of my archived files, and I can not even look at them without syncing to Intuit. Basically, Intuit has stolen my data.
I am moving to an environment when I will be using satellite internet which is slow and expensive. I cannot afford to sync data to a worthless cloud service

The Quicken 2016 CD would not work. Apparently the one I received from Intuit did not support Windows 10. Quicken customer service downloaded Rev 5 which ultimately worked. There customer service is a joke. I had another issue regarding “everything else” in the budget tab. After two hours on the phone with customer service, who had no idea what I was talking about, they suggested that I contact Intuit engineering to advise them of this known problem. DONT BUY QUICKEN anything.

Long time user, Installed Q16, new security stuff, After 3 hours of trying to login, I found it doesn’t work for W10! LucklelyI was able to uninstall and go back to Q13.

Have tried Quicken Premier 2015 as a first time user. Just terrible! Invested over 30 hours trying to work out “kinks” of basic functions–downloading transactions. I am done.
Any suggestions on a program that works?