Hi Dick,

Using M04, I do a "download and match manually entered transactions"... it's
a win for me because of the sheer number of transactions in my checking
account... going to a web site and trying to reconcile would be a pain. I
usually have no problems matching... every once in a while, an incorrect
match will occur which I then separate and match correctly. Now, when the
paper statement comes due, just entering the totals will perform a
reconciliation since the transactions have been previously downloaded. If
there is a discrepency, it will show up. In my experience, as long as one
puts in the correct statement date, it gets it right.

-- John

"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:OTO9nePoEHA.3676[at]TK2MSFTNGP14.phx.gbl...
- quote -

In microsoft.public.money, Art McClinton wrote:

- quote -

Actually for Money 2005, that does not work. There is a way to get
the files if the need comes up.

I have experienced your problem with Fidelity 3 times in as many months. In
talking to a Fidelity internet service rep. I found this to be a recurring
problem mostly with Quicken users and not so often with MS Money users.
However it did happen with my file.
The solution that the Fidelity rep gave me was to disable online service
with Fidelity, close Money then reopen Money and set up online service with
Fidelity. Each of the 3 times that happened to me during the past 3 months,
I followed his fix and it Worked! Of course it would be better if it cured
the problem instead of just temporarily fixing it.
So maybe you should try it. Nothing to loose.
John


"K" <anonymous[at]discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:07c101c4a12c$78c5fa10$a301280a[at]phx.gbl...
- quote -

Fidelity is probably the only account that is working for me in Money
2005. I have all of the other Yodlee run accounts currently on incident
reports to Microsoft. I consider that Yodlee is a hit and miss effort
and expect that soon I will give up on any accounts that use Yodlee.

Fidelity on the other hand is two way connection without Yodlee so when
you do an update, you can hold <ctl> <shft> and actually get a copy of
the file that is being sent so it can be reviewed to determine if it is
a Fidelity problem or a Money problem. I have pointed out errors to
Fidelity and several banks and credit cards by capturing the file. I
agree that it should not be an issue that a normal user would or should
have to do. If you have read the Bank of America stream here, you can
see how several people helped out to resolve the issue.

Best wishes on you getting a solution to your problem. I would suggest
you submit it to Microsoft for analysis.


K wrote:
- quote -

In microsoft.public.money, K wrote:

- quote -

What I would consider is to make a copy of the file in case you
don't like the results. Work with one of the copies.

Delete the statement by right-clicking where the Account List says
you have transactions to read.

Disable that Fidelity account for online update.

Set up the account for online update again. Hope that the new
statements work right.

If they don't, again disable that Fidelity account for online
update. Rename the account to Fidelity Problem Account or some such.

Print your registers so you can compare later. You can install
pdf995.com or cutepdf.com free PDF writing software to print to a
PDF file if you like. Sort Cash Transactions by date and Print
the register with landscape orientation. Do the same for the
Investment transactions. These could be useful later for comparison
to see if things are right.


Create a new Fidelity investment account.

In the bad account, I would look thru the Cash Transactions for any
Transfer to/from a different account (other than the Fidelity
Investment Transactions account). Right click each and
CutAndPasteToAccount to move those transactions to the new account.
That way those transactions would not have to be involved in the QIF
export/import.

Do a QIF export from the Cash Transactions of the bad account.
Name the file "FidelityCash.qif". Do a QIF export from the
Investment Transactions of the bad account. Name the file
"_FidelityInvest.qif". Note that leading underscore. That is to make
that file come first alphabetically.

Delete the bad account.

File-> Import the two QIF files into the new Fidelity account. It is
important to use Ctrl+<click> to select BOTH files for simultanious
import.

Look thru registers and adjust if necessary.

Set up Fidelity for online download.

Art,
That's great that 2005 is working for you and perhaps you
will never experience the problems I have experienced.
But guess what? It is still a problem with 2005! I
tried 2005 thinking(rather, hoping) that it was going to
be fixed and the exact problem is STILL there. I have a
total of 8 Fidelity accounts, I do a lot of trading too.
Add to that a couple of brokerage accounts that have a
lot of transactions too and it goes to show that I rely
very heavily on being able to download these transactions
(to reconcile, categories etc) on a daily basis. But I
can't even get to the transactions even though money has
downloaded them.

This is a known problem, and MS has a KB article for it,
along with the steps to correct the problem (which it
doesn't). Here is the link:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?
kbid=829143&Product=mny

Thanks for your comments Art! I hope you continue to
enjoy using Money; I wish I could say the same.



- quote -

Thanks for providing that link, it's got some good info.
In my case, it's a little different. As I have stated
before, I've used Money for quite some time. I have
never considered the Fidelity Investments downloads to
be "quirky" though. I understand, that Money can not
custom-tailor their app to be 100% compatible with each
provider. However, it isn't that the downloads
are "quirky", they DO get downloaded, I just can't read
my transactions and obviously I can't reconcile them
either. This seems to be a new development that has
started happening over the past 2 months or so.

It is frustrating beyond words, that I see Transactions
To Read: 50 and I can't get to them. I am not here to
bash microsoft, but something has gone wrong in their
QA/Marketing cycle to allow this known error to be
propagated from version to version going all the way back
to 2001!

See this link:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?
kbid=829143&Product=mny

It is a shame that MS has allowed this to happen. I
think Money is a great program. But it my information is
not up-to-date or if it is getting corrupted; what's the
point?

K


- quote -

Yes, it included all of these things. I am using 2004
and I'm wondering if this is a 2004+ issue. Anyway, I'm
pretty much dead in the water and not happy about it.

What really ticks me off is that MS knows about this
problem going back at least two versions. I think it is
really unreasonable to ask people to have to go through
all the steps and STILL have it in a broken state. Since
the cornerstone of Money is linkage with financial
institutions you would think fixing this would be
priority 1, but the problem is still there.


- quote -

I agree that under Money 04 I had extreme difficulties with Fidelity
Netbenefits (401K/403B) accounts, but under Money 05 they have worked
flawlessly (so far) and even the one account that previously did not
work now works. I enter the manounts manually (bill pay) and then find
that the Money download offers to match/correct the differences in price
or shares.

Retired Coal Miner wrote:

- quote -

I generally agree with your motives and rationale. I just accomplish the
same objectives without getting Money and my Money file involved.

I meet the first and part of the second by going directly to the credit
union/Discover/Mileage+ Visa sites about three times a month and scanning
the transactions--once to epay the bill, once in mid cycle more or less, and
once when the billing cycle has ended, to get a balance due to enter in the
register and flag to remind myself to go back to the beginning and do the
epay. Sometimes I look at other times for other reasons, but not frequently.

I meet the balance of the second objective and the third objective by
balancing to the paper statements. It is a rare month when one of these
opportunities doesn't catch something like a missed transaction--e.g., wife
hasn't dropped the ticket in my pile yet--or one with a typo in the amount.
But I'm so close so often that I don't gain much peace of mind knowing it to
be the case rather than just suspecting it.

"Retired Coal Miner" <...[at]...> wrote in message
news:k-2dnZ94r4WDaMzcRVn-rA[at]comcast.com...
- quote -

- quote -

phone number every day like I do. The monthly statements are now updated daily
by most places and are available via phone or internet. Steve

One thing you gain is you don't have to wait up to 30 days for a paper
statement from your bank/cc co./FI. You see what was transacted against
your account when the transactions post to the account. Additionally,
for credit cards, if you see transactions that you did not make you
become very suspicious, and you don't wait 30 days for that to happen
(ref: the current stories about identity thefts).

It also forces one to consistently enter and watch transactions closely.
For example, if you see a transaction for which there is no manually
entered match, that means either you forgot to enter it, or it was a
mistake, or someone in your household entered it and forgot to tell you
about it.

In my case there's an additional factor, peace of mind in knowing that
my records are current and match the banks, without waiting for the end
of the statement cycle to catch up.

Dick Watson wrote:

- quote -

I know I can get it to match and not trash what I've entered. (With the
proviso that many people even seem to have trouble with that step.)

But what's the value? I've already typed it all in. The net gain is that it
sets the C or E or R flag? Who cares? That can't be a good time tradeoff vs.
the amount of time it takes to setup and maintain the connection, watch the
download, and do the matching--of everything I already typed in.

"Retired Coal Miner" <...[at]...> wrote in message
news:0OednYKZ3fB8OMzcRVn-iQ[at]comcast.com...
- quote -

You don't lose the split details when you match a downloaded transaction
to an entry you made manually. That is my experience with matching
deposits and downloads (in M03 -- I'll guess debits work the same, but I
haven't paid close attention recently). You simply click Accept and the
manual transaction gets marked appropriately, and the split amounts and
details do not change.

I'd advise to not reply solely on downloads, especially for new users,
do manual entries and use the match feature.


Dick Watson wrote:

- quote -

Since I feel like I ADD a lot of detail to my data that I'd never get
downloaded, I wonder if my ratio of memos, splits, and classification to
transactions is a whole lot higher than yours. This is one of the reasons
I'm convinced it would not save me effort.

For instance, 8 or 9 out of 10 transactions at the grocery store that would
download as nothing more than Groceries I split into two or typically three
elements: Food:Groceries, Miscellaneous:Supplies, and Transferpocket
change [me and/or my wife]). Occasionally you can add things to that like
Leisure:Books and Magazines or Housing:Gardening or...

If I just download, all of that gets lost--the Transfers being a very
significant thing to lose. If I manually enter then match it, what have I
bought myself but I've spent the time and hassle screwing around with the
download. If I don't do anything until I get the downloaded transaction and
then I go to add the extra data, I've forgotten what it was or have to go
dig the receipt back out or whatever. Since the majority (I'm guessing, but
not without some basis in thought) of my transactions have a) splits, and/or
b) memos (and not some stupid merchant number or something), and/or c)
classification, none of which downloads, I don't see the benefit. When
downloaded data reflects what I spent the Money on (Miscellaneous:Supplies
at the Food:Groceries store) and why (Automobile:Gasoline for the
Automobile:SLK), not just what kind of place it was where I spent it, then
I'll consider reconsidering.

I recognize my case doesn't and needn't match yours or anyone else's. But I
still believe that new users shouldn't do the downloaded data thing until
they could do with out it and many users have more trouble with downloaded
data than they'd have without it if they only worked for a while at getting
good at doing without it.

M05 clearly throws a wrench in my theory: they are trying to sell two
products in one. The first I'll call Money View. It's for passive users that
really don't want to manage their money actively and happily take the bank's
word for anything. Downloads are perfect for this crowd because it's all
they'll ever do. The second I'll call Money Management. It's for people who
already use Money effectively. Why they tried to shoehorn these into the
same single product (Merge Duplicate Accounts? What kind of kludge is that?)
is a mystery to me.

"Chris Cowles" <NoSpam[at]For.me> wrote in message
news:eyZn3AGoEHA.592[at]TK2MSFTNGP11.phx.gbl...
- quote -

I accept that.

"Chris Cowles" <NoSpam[at]For.me> wrote in message
news:eyZn3AGoEHA.592[at]TK2MSFTNGP11.phx.gbl...
- quote -

I agree with you here, but dick is right about first getting experience by
doing things manually. I did and I think a lot of the mvp's here did also
long before online banking became so prevalent. Because of this I know how
the program handles things and have never had any problems once starting to
download my data. Just my experience.

Jim

"Chris Cowles" <NoSpam[at]For.me> wrote in message
news:eyZn3AGoEHA.592[at]TK2MSFTNGP11.phx.gbl...
- quote -

We disagree consistently on that point, Dick, but I'm not about to put my
financial data on MS's web servers. My problems with downloading data
directly from my bank are rare and the labor savings are substantial. I
actually keep a lot more detail than I would if I had to enter everything
manually.
--
Chris Cowles,
Gainesville, FL

"Dick Watson" <littlegreengecko[at]mind-enufalready-spring.com> wrote in
message news:%23COO6sDoEHA.3224[at]tk2msftngp13.phx.gbl...
- quote -

Fidelity's downloads for Money are definitely quirky. There is a history
on this newsgroup of people having unusual problems when using downloads
with Fidelity.

What you describe sounds similar to an issue from a while ago. Take a
look at messages in the url below and try the suggestions mentioned near
the bottom of that thread (be prepared to try a few different things and
spend some time on this):

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=e...e08b5e8bee19f7

I still like the ability to download transactions, even with Fidelity's
quirks. So, my opinion differs from Dick Watson's advice about
downloading transactions; when downloads work correctly, they are
enormously convenient and very helpful. But to the uninitiated, they
take some getting used to, primarily because things are not intuitive at
first. My suggestion is to manually enter all transactions possible,
and continue to download, and use the match feature to match what your
bank downloaded to what you entered. In my opinion this is the best
tradeoff of both worlds, and eliminates sole reliance on your bank's
data and systems working correctly.

You can't manually enter all the your Fidelity transactions ahead of
time, with monthly sweep interest for example, the downloads will show
up before you get the paper statement. One more thing, Fidelity's
transactions do not follow exactly the model Money expects for cash and
investment account transactions, and some manual moving of things at the
end of the month is always required. Search on here for Fidelity and
sweep account for more background info.

Before you toss Money, why don't you try entering your own data for a month
or two? Downloaded data causes many people more problems than it can
possibly be worth, near as I can tell.

"K" <anonymous[at]discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:34c701c4a027$c1efbf60$a501280a[at]phx.gbl...
- quote -