Scheduled update for Elan Financial pauses to answer security question and hangs

Charlie@

Frequently (but not always) in the middle of a One Step Update, I get a small dialog box from Elan Financial asking for the answer to one of my security questions. This is not a problem if I manually initiated the one step update, as I simply answer the question and the update takes off and finishes.
However, when this happens during my daily scheduled update and I am not there to answer the question it may sit there for many hours. Then, when I arrive and answer the question, the update process "hangs". Nothing happens. The small yellow up/down arrows persist in the tray, and the task manager shows Quicken getting considerable CPU, but again nothing happening.
I end up terminating both Quicken and the background agent from the task manager before I can open Quicken and re-run the update. Once done all seems fine until the next time this happens (this is variable but usually 2-3 times per week).
Is this something unique to Elan and is there any way to prevent it?

Quicken Anja

Hello @Charlie@,

Thank you for reaching out to the Community to tell us about your issue, though I apologize that you are experiencing this.

Could you please provide which version of Quicken you have currently running?

• Help > About Quicken

If you don't mind, I would just like to gain some clarification first in order to better assist you further.

Have you always been prompted to answer security questions for Elan Financial Services when running a One Step Update, or did these prompts just recently occur? If this behavior started recently; do you recall when it first started? How many accounts with Elan Financial Services do you have set up in Quicken that are experiencing this issue? 

Please, check back and let us know! Thank you.

Charlie@

Anja, it's the latest Windows Quicken: R31.12.
So I first set up the Elan account in Dec. 2019. Only the one account, and yes it has periodically asked for the answer to a security question since the beginning, but more often over the last two weeks. Hope that helps.

Quicken Anja

Thank you for the additional information.

If you haven't already, I suggest that you please try deactivating the account experiencing this issue and then reactivating through Add Account (not through Setup Now).

Please, follow the steps found in this support article to deactivate. Once deactivated, to reactivate through Add Account, navigate to Tools > Add Account..., search for your Financial Institution name and follow the prompts to connect. Once your account(s) have been found, be sure to use the dropdown menu under the Action column to link it to the existing account you have already set up in Quicken.

Let us know how it goes!

Charlie@

Anja, I have not performed your suggested steps because Elan has stopped asking security questions. But I have to stress that this issue is not really with the security questions - it is the Quicken program hanging and having to be manually terminated. Your engineers should be able to simulate this issue and figure out what is causing Quicken to hang. And when I have to terminate it, I can see that it is getting CPU time, but really nothing is happening after I answer the security question - probably because the online session has long ago terminated but Quicken doesn't seem to realize that.

Charlie@

Anja, so a couple days ago I had the same issue: Elan asked me to answer a security question and after I did that, Quicken was hung - I could not open Quicken without first terminating it via task manager. So I took your advice and removed the online services, re-added the service and matched it up with the existing account.
Now this morning about 1.5 hours after the daily scheduled update ran, I noticed the window for Elan Financial asking for the answer to a security question. I gave the answer and now Quicken is hung again. In the tray there is still the double up/down arrows that are present when an update is running in the background. Quicken, of course, will not open if it thinks an update is running - but nothing is happening no matter how long I wait. In order to get it to work I have to bring up the task manager and terminate the Quicken program, or re-boot my desktop. This constant hanging of the Quicken program has become very irritating.

Quicken Anja

@Charlie@ Thanks for the update and additional information! 

Next, I suggest you try signing out of your data file completely and then signing back in. Please, follow the steps below in order to do so.

1. Navigate to Edit
2. Preferences...
3. Quicken ID & Cloud accounts
4. Click Sign in as a different user (or it might say Sign in using a different Quicken ID)
5. Follow the prompts to Sign Out
6. Sign back in using your Quicken ID (email) and password (this screen is not a pop-up box)
   

See if this helps make a difference in the OSU hanging.

Let me know how it goes!

Charlie@

OK, that is completed. I'll let you know what happens the next time Elan flips up a security question.

Charlie@

The problem happened again this morning. Approx one hour after the OSU ran, I came to my desktop to see a window from Elan asking me to answer a security question. I did so, and now Quicken is hung. A typical OSU takes about 1 minute to complete, but has now been 15 minutes since I answered the question and it is still stuck in some sort of loop. I tried executing Quicken but nothing happens. In the task manager I can see that Quicken appeared first in the Background Process section and was getting a lot of CPU time. After a few minutes it now appears in the Apps section, but is getting no CPU time and has not really opened. At this point I have to terminate it via the task manager.
Another note: When this happens and I am finally able to open Quicken, the OSU summary window opens up and Elan is not shown at all. Usually if there is a failure of some sort Elan would be in the list of Financial Institutions with a failure code, but Its not there at all.
What can we do to get this problem fixed?

Quicken Anja

@Charlie@ Thanks for the update and additional information, though I apologize for the delay in my response.

In that case, next, I suggest that you try and perform a clean uninstall/reinstall (this is different from simply uninstalling and reinstalling the program) which will clear out and replace the existing configuration files for Quicken (this does not affect any of your data and/or backup files).

To do so, please refer to this support article and scroll down to the section titled If the steps above do not resolve the issue. Then, open and follow the instructions found in the blue dropdown sections titled First: Download and use QCleanUI and Second: Rename Quicken Shared Folders.

Let us know how it goes!