Problems Retrieving from Fidelity

[jeffweiss9]

I have the evaluation version that I'm testing with just a couple of my accounts and having some problems. With Fidelity, the bonds and stocks seem to be working but I have two money market funds that keep returning with a price of $0.01 every time I update prices. Can anyone tell me how to get these returning the correct $1.00 price? Also, for some reason it set up a CASH investment, although it says the default money market for this account is one of the two money market funds. For some reason, a bond redemption went into this CASH investment instead of the default money market. The properties for the account give the correct default. Is there a way to prevent this from happening?
THanks for your help. If I can get these few accounts working correctly, then I'll purchase the program.
-Jeff

[jeffweiss9]

I tried to reconcile by deleting the last two pricings in 2010 that had $0.01 for these two money market funds. The price before 1/1/10 was $1. but updates to 0.01.
I deleted the cash account and purchased the same amount in one of the money markets to try to get that in the right place, but, although it registered the purchase, the total amount for that money market fund did not change from the total prior to the purchase.
Sure is mysterious. I hope someone can tell me how this is supposed to work.
THanks,
Jeff

[Mark]

Hi Jeff,

On the price updating problem... Normally cash and money market investments are set to not retrieve pricing. If you retrieve prices, you'll get their 7 day yield from Yahoo, instead of $1. When you create a new cash investment FM should turn off this option by default, but somehow it sounds like yours is on. Right mouse click on the money market funds, and choose 'Investment Properties...'. Click on the 'Internet Retrieve' tab, and turn OFF the option to 'Retrieve Price'. This will prevent any future price updates to these investments whenever you retrieve prices.

If you record a new purchase, this should increase the shares you own as of that date. When recording transactions in cash/money markets, leave the price at 1, and set the shares to equal the value of the transaction. Where were you viewing the total amount for the money market fund? If you use the "Data Register", and look under the "Investments (all)" data type, the number of shares owned on any given date is the sum of all these transactions, up to that date. If you are looking at the value of the money market in the Portfolio Editor window, keep in mind that is showing the market value as of the current date, so if you've accidentally recorded transactions for a future date, those wouldn't be included in the amount shown in the Portfolio Editor.

[jeffweiss9]

Mark-
Thanks. Your first paragraph fixed the money market price problem (it would be nice to actually see the current yields displayed somewhere else).
Not totally sure about your second paragraph but I traced the reconciliation errors that remained after fixing the $1 price of the money market to MOSTLY an incorrect original "Adjustment to obtain retreived balance". Once I deleted that and put the correct amount in for that date from my written statement, AND once I also added the money market monthly dividends that were also missing, it now reconciles correctly. This leads to the following additional questions:
1) Why aren't the monthly dividends from this same core money market (Fidelity California Muni Money Market) fund being recorded when I retrieved transactions? Is it possibly because they were in these 3 months less than $1.00?
2) How do I get older transactions included? These went back to 8/28/09 but I'd like to at least get all of 2009. Will FM retrieve those and push the record correctly back in time?
THanks very much.
-Jeff

[jeffweiss9]

Mark- Working further gives more problems/questions in trying to set this up:
3) American Century Investments: got "failed to receive portfolio", "Signon Invalid"; 'your Tax ID (SS or employee ID #) must be numeric and set to 9 digits'. FM never asked me for my SS #. How does one set up access an American Century account (single mutual fund) when its complaining about a social security number that FM doesn't ask for?
4) I have several Vanguard IRA accounts but none would set up (several Fidelity IRA accounts had no problem). They also all gave "Failed to retrieve portfolio", "signon invalid", yet I use the same signon (user name, password) as I do for 5 other non-IRA Vanguard accounts that are retrieving without problem. I'm logged into Vanguard's web site right now and see all of these accounts. What needs to be different for retrieving Vanguard IRA accounts from Vanguard taxable brokerage and mutual fund accounts so they will also work?
Thanks very much.
-Jeff

[Mark]

Hi Jeff,

1) I don't know why those aren't retrieving. They should, as long as they are being provided by your broker. As long as the transaction was 0.01 or more, they would be retrieved if provided. You might want to take a look for them in the raw log files, and see if they are there or not. Take a look at the bottom of this page for help finding the log files:

http://www.fundmanagersoftware.com/tintrtv.html

Take a look in the xmldump.txt file, that is a more human-readable format of the raw data. If you want me to take a look, send me that log file.

2) Different brokers keep transactions for different amounts of time on their OFX server. Sounds like Fidelity may only keep them for 90 days for your accounts. FM will retrieve transactions for any time period. If you can only retrieve 90 days, you then have the option of modifying the "Adjustment" entry. You can either delete it, and manually record all the prior transactions, or import them from a file you may have, or maybe you can download from your broker's web site. It does not matter what order you "enter" your transactions, just that the transaction date is specified correctly.

3) American Century uses your SS# for the user-id. Where you enter your transaction retrieve settings, enter your SS# (without dashes) for the user id.

4) Usually nothing... You might try retrieving with no account number recorded. When you do this, FM will sign on, get a list of account numbers for that user id, and prompt you with that list. If you have the same user id for all your accounts, you should see a listing of all the accounts, including the ones you're already retrieving okay. If you can't get past the sign-on, then somehow your user id and password aren't being entered properly for that sub-portfolio.

[jeffweiss9]

Thanks, Mark-
Re 1): I tried to retrieve transactions again for that money market fund and again neither the dividends or the dividend reinvestments appeared in the data register. (It did come back with three repeat bond interest payments that, in spite of my checking the box for not retrieving investments already in the register, were then posted there.) I'm wondering if maybe I have an obsolete version. I have v 10.0 with quote module 410.
I found the xmidump.txt file and I can see the missing dividends are in that file. They are very small amounts< $1, $0.09 in the example below, and they don't look any different to me than a bunch of others that did post properly.
- INCOME
- INVTRAN
- FITID (xxxxxxxxxxx)
- DTTRADE (xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx[-5:EDT])
- MEMO (DIVIDEND RECEIVED)
- SECID
- UNIQUEID (xxxxxxx)
- UNIQUEIDTYPE (CUSIP)
- INCOMETYPE (DIV)
- TOTAL (+00000000000000.0900)
- SUBACCTSEC (CASH)
- SUBACCTFUND (CASH)
- CURRENCY
- CURRATE (1.00)
- CURSYM (USD)

Re 3): My previous unsuccessful tries with American Century caused my account to be locked out. I'll try with the SS#, after I've managed to get it unlocked.
Re 4): Signing on a Vanguard IRA account with no account number did not work. I didn't get to see all my accounts. Instead, I got an invalid signon dialog box. (SS# as an account number didn't work either). Any other suggestions why it won't retrieve IRA's?

[Mark]

Thank you for contacting Beiley Software. We are currently closed for vacation Tuesday and Wednesday January 12th and 13th. We will reply to your email when we return.

[jeffweiss9]

ok, item 4) is the big one. Portfolio wizard will not set up any of the 5 or 6 Vanguard IRA's I need to monitor. All give login errors even though I can log into Vanguard on the web and see them all, using the same UN and PW. Vanguard says there should be NO DIFFERENCE, although they only support Quicken or Money, not FM. This is my next big obstacle. Logging in with no account number or with SS# doesn't work (I tried).
Thanks,
-Jeff

[Mark]

Hi Jeff,

1) Since you see the dividends in the log file, they should import. The value does not matter. When you retrieve, do you have on the option to "Create New Investments Automatically As Needed"? Are you sure they haven't already been retrieved? If you retrieve and turn OFF the option to "Ignore transactions already in FM", do you see them? Do not click "Finish" here, as you'll double enter your transactions, but you can retrieve with this option off, and just get to the "Preview" dialog, so you can see everything. If you have on the option to create new investments automatically and have the option off to ignore already retrieved transaction, you will see everything. Make sure you can see these dividends, and then go back, and try it with the option to ignore already entered transactions turned on, and see if they go away. If so, then they're already recorded.

4) You mentioned you had 5 non-IRA Vanguard accounts that retrieve okay, and you're using the same user ID and password for your IRA accounts. If this is correct, you should be able to set up an account with no account number, and retrieve to get past the sign-on invalid error. Since you're retrieving in those 5 other accounts with that username/password it isn't invalid, unless maybe you're typing it differently by mistake? When you tried retrieving with no account number, did you get a sign-on invalid, or did you just get only your 5 non-IRA accounts listed? Normally all your accounts are available, and you don't have to do anything special.

[jeffweiss9]

Hi, Mark-
On 1), I think I see what my problem is. I unchecked "ignore transactions alread in FM" and I did see the missing dividends. However, checking those and unchecking all the others and clicking finish did NOT get them to record in the register under investments. But they DID record in the register under distributions. Thus the problem seems to be that FM is not reinvesting the dividends even though this money market fund is listed in the properties of the account as the "default cash account" which I presume means all such cash should flow into it. This is strange since dividends from other investments (bonds and other mutual funds) all do go into this money market successfully but I think there is normally an extra reinvestment transaction that is missing for these. Any ideas for what next?
On 3), using my SS# as UserID for American Century did not work. I got "Signon Invalid: The tax identification number and Personal Access Code you have entered is not a valid combination. As before, I then logged on fine on the web using the original userid and the same password. I also changed so it recognized my computer without asking me pre-arranged security questions. Trying to setup the account with Portfolio Wizard gave the very same signon invalid response.
On 4) THIS TECHNIQUE WORKED! Setting up without an account number did show me a list of all the account numbers and I was able to find the IRA accounts on the list and I was able to set them up.
Think I'm getting close.
-Jeff

[Mark]

Hi Jeff,

1) It sounds like the dividends on your money market are not being reported as reinvested. FM will not record an automatic corresponding entry into the default cash account for transactions in the default cash account itself. I think this is a somewhat common problem that probably needs a fix. We will look into adding an option to force any distributions in the default cash account as being recorded as reinvested. For now, you can go edit them, and turn on the option to make them reinvested.

3) Did you try entering the SS# without any dashes? I believe it should be just the numbers, and nothing else. If that still doesn't work, you might call American Century.

[jeffweiss9]

Hi, Mark-
On 1), glad you're going to look at that one as a known 'common' problem. Fortunately, it's not a show stopper.
On 3), I did enter SS# without dashes. I've emailed American Century to see if they can tell me what they want, as I don't want to lock out the account again with repeated wrong logons.
A new one:
5) I tried to logon to my Vanguard retirement account (403b) per your instruction (that worked with all the IRA's). I can see the account number (really the group number) in Portfolio Wizard but when try to continue it finds no investments. Any idea on that one?
6) Same as 5) with a Fidelity 403b. In this case, the account isn't in the list.
For these retirement accounts do I just have to try to download a Quicken file from the web and import that to FM?
Thanks again.
-Jeff

[Mark]

Hi Jeff,

5 & 6) You're using the Portfolio Wizard for both of these, right? What type of retrieve did you select? Transactions only, or transactions + Positions? One possibility is if you retrieved only transactions, that you don't have any transactions available within the time period they store on their OFX server. If you retrieve transactions + positions, or positions only, you should get any investments currently held. If not, I'd suggest taking a look in those same log files, specifically xmldump.txt, and see what it is reporting as positions for your account.

Sometimes, you may not have access to all of your accounts. It is possible that they do not make available some of your accounts on their OFX server. You'd just have to check with them, but if you retrieve with an empty account number, you should see all available accounts for the userid/password you entered. If they aren't on the OFX server, then yes, you could download/import from whatever format they make available on their web site.

[modelerMike]

Would it be worthwhile to get Quicken for doing downloads for firms that support Quicken but not FM ? Do you think one would get more complete data RETREIVALS this way ... without the need to resort to 'Generic Transaction' file-based load approach ... even if it introduces two stpes into the proces; i.e. get brokerage transactions RETRIEVED into Quciken and then export Quicken transactions into FM via .QIF files ? Guidance appreciated.

Regards,
Mike