How to get Quicken 2005 for free

[yesthattom]

I've been using Quicken since the mid-90's, most likely about 12 years. Every year they send me an offer to save 10% off on the next year's edition. If I ignore it long enough they actually call me (yes, call me) to remind me that through this exclusive offer for people that have the current version, I can save a whole 10%. I tell them that I've found a way to save 50%. "How do you do that?" they ask. "I only upgrade every other year." *click*

However, I've been using Quicken 2002 on my Windows PC since 2001 since I'm not going to spend money until I can buy it for the Mac and get a full-featured release, something that hasn't happened yet. At that point I'm going to start fresh with a new database. After 12 years I've accumulated too many useless categories and other cruft. (I also can't do this until Alimony is done, since I want all payments to L to be in one database.)

I do, however, pay $9.99/month for their Quicken Bill Pay service, which used to be called Checkfree. I know it's $120/year that some banks do for free, but I don't want to switch until I start fresh on the Mac (and until Alimony is done, since she complains to ME mightily when she loses the checks, imagine her complaint if I screwed up payment).

Last week I got a free copy of Quicken 2005 in the mail. It seems that Quicken Bill Pay will soon no longer work with Q2002 and they decided its easier to send free copies to people that are paying the outragous $120/year than to badger them about upgrading.

So, for only $120/year, it turns out every 3-4 years you can get a free copy of Quicken. Now that's financial advice you won't find anywhere else. w00t.

Comments

[entirelysonja.livejournal.com]

Interesting!

Just so you don't feel all alone, we also pay $10 a month for Quicken Bill Pay, which we've been using for 10+ years -- we like their service because we have three different checking accounts with different banks, and we have them all set up with Quicken Bill Pay for the same monthly fee.

[labrown.livejournal.com]

Dunno if this is important to you or not, but my credit union's online banking site has a web page about Quicken 2005:

Dear Users of Quicken,

Intuit has announced that Quicken version 2005 will no longer support the .QIF file import capability. Today, you can download your Coastal transactions from COLTS or the e-Statement site in a .QIF file, and import that file into Quicken.

In the future, .QIF transaction downloads will continue to be available to you from COLTS and e-Statement. These download files will continue to work with Quicken 2004 and earlier versions as they have in the past. At this point, we have no plans to discontinue that support.

If you chose to upgrade to or purchase Quicken 2005, you will lose the ability to import your Coastal transactions. Intuit does have a service we are evaluating that would enable you to receive periodic and real-time Coastal transaction downloads via the Internet. We are evaluating the technical and financial feasibility of making this connectivity option available in the future. This capability will not be in place during 2004.

We appreciate your business with Coastal, and will advise you later this year about our plans for supporting this new connectivity option.