retrieve transactions dates

[JeanneMarie]

Something just happened and I really can't say why with any certainty, let alone discuss a fix with any intelligence. But I'd like you to know about it: I started to update one sub-portfolio and happily noticed that Fund Manager amassed years worth of transactions. So I cancelled and re-started, setting the start date to yesterday.

This happened once before but at least the problem was traceable to a software update and my INattention to the dates in the RETRIEVE dialog. This time, all I did was transfer all shares from one investment to another in the same sub-portfolio. Then, having downloaded transactions only yesterday, I did not realize I needed to pay extra attention to the dates in that dialog.

As before when such a surprise has happened, I panicked, so I can't say whether perhaps all of those entries were, in fact, for one or both of the two investments involved in the transfer. (And perhaps no others? And perhaps no other sub-portfolio would have been affected?)

And maybe Fidelity is part of the problem...? I suggest this because this was a transfer of many many small transactions from FCASH to one of its money market funds (SPAXX), my new Default Cash Account in this sub-portfolio. Altho the TRANSFER to SPAXX showed up on Fidelity's web site right away, the company clearly did not send Fund Manager any info about a transfer or purchase of SPAXX. So SPAXX never showed up in FM until SPAXX paid my first dividend. Then I realized I had to (a) identify my new Default Cash Account and (b) do that transfer.

This was not super-messy. Just a few transactions over a couple of days. But accidentally downloading a huge amount of history could have been a bummer. And, as I say, I can't suggest anything useful about protecting me from my own inattention or anomalies in how different institutions feed info to Fund Manager. Perhaps a different design of the RETRIEVE dialog would help, making the dates more prominent. It probably wouldn't hurt--although I'd be the first to admit that it's easy to glide right past such a thing when doing repetitive tasks. It's hard to protect the user from all eventualities, eh?

Hope this is useful to somebody.

Thanks for listening.

[Mark]

Hi JeanneMarie,

Okay, thanks for sharing and the feedback. Normally there are 2 things that prevent duplicates from history coming in during a transaction retrieve:

1) The date range filter
2) The option "Skip Transactions Already in Fund Manager"

The date range is set based on your last retrieve for that sub-portfolio. The "Skip..." option is a global preference that stays how you set it (and is on by default).

[JeanneMarie]

Thanks, Mark. Your thoughts are always welcome and interesting. But continue only as long as this is useful, because I've spent enough time staring at this pretty minor (for me) puzzle.

FYI, my RETRIEVE dialog has "skip" and "create new" on by default.

But SPAXX was a new investment with no history in FM. Further, the FM TRANSFER BETWEEN INVESTMENTS process did not move a few years worth of entries. It moved the lion's share of the balance in one big entry. (And even if it had moved all those little entries in FCASH, perhaps FM's RETRIEVE function would still not have recognized them as "duplicate" entries since they aren't associated with the same investment [cusip]?)

So I'm now wondering whether Fidelity was feeding all that FCASH history into FM's SPAXX position (redundantly) and FM followed along. I can't be sure because, as I mentioned, I panicked and aborted without seriously examining all the entries on offer.

When I re-started the RETRIEVE process, double checking that the start date was the previous day, all went well. So either the start date in FM's RETRIEVE process somehow had been changed on the first try or something else is going on "under the hood" in FM OR Fidelity (and I'll never see it).

Was this related to having done the transfer between investments in FM? Certainly seemed to be. That was the action I took just before the RETRIEVE that I aborted.

But net-net, I see this whole thing as partly caused by my own neglect for a few days and, possibly, some anomaly at Fidelity (not the first anomaly I've noticed). I'm not sure there is anything you can do except point out some possible pitfalls in connection with FM's TRANSFER BETWEEN INVESTMENTS in the documentation.

For as long as your patience can last...

As mentioned, when FM transferred the balance from FCASH to SPAXX on 9/4, it transferred the lion's share with the annotation "from 8/5/2024" and then transferred the only other "purchases" in FCASH individually. This was a mere four small entries annotated "from" 8/30 and 8/31 (which were the original dates of those "purchases" in FCASH).

But I had switched my "core account" on Fidelity's books on 8/1 but didn't tell FM about it (changed my Default Cash Account in FM) until 9/4. (I guess I would have had to create SPAXX manually to make it the Default Cash Account in FM.) So briefly, while FM still hadn't created the SPAXX investment (upon receiving the first dividend 8/31), entries that were probably in SPAXX on Fidelity's books went into FCASH in FM. Then they got transferred individually, but separately from all the cash that had accumulated before 8/1, when I did the FM TRANSFER on 9/4.

As mentioned, continue only if this could be of use to you.

[Mark]

Hi JeanneMarie,

It sounds like there are a couple reasons why the "Skip Transactions Already in FM" wouldn't have prevented duplicates, but the date range filter should always prevent any out of date transactions from showing up. Hopefully things are cleared up and working smoothly going forward. If not, please do let me know...