R39.17/R39.21 Paycheck Corruption [Edited]

Robert Chiarulli

> @Jim_Harman said:
> @Robert Chiarulli
> And after restoring the backup it was OK? 

Yes, I do not validate my file any longer

FredArthur

Question:
I have never used the Paycheck Wizard. However, over the last few weeks I have noticed that my REMINDERS (Bills and Income -> Projected Balances) with splits are corrupted; instead of three lines the split will contain the same three lines repeated multiple times. Sometimes the Amount column appears correct but the Closing Balance column becomes an astronomical number! In other instances, the amount column is incorrect but the REMINDER is correct. 

I deleted the corrupted REMINDERS and reentered them. But I have the feeling it is continuing to happen; deja vu - all over again.

Is this symptomatic of the reported problem?

Thank you,

Fred J.

Chris_QPW

FredArthur said:

Question:
I have never used the Paycheck Wizard. However, over the last few weeks I have noticed that my REMINDERS (Bills and Income -> Projected Balances) with splits are corrupted; instead of three lines the split will contain the same three lines repeated multiple times. Sometimes the Amount column appears correct but the Closing Balance column becomes an astronomical number! In other instances, the amount column is incorrect but the REMINDER is correct. 

I deleted the corrupted REMINDERS and reentered them. But I have the feeling it is continuing to happen; deja vu - all over again.

Is this symptomatic of the reported problem?

Thank you,

Fred J.

As far as I know, the reported problem has always been for the paycheck reminders only.

On the other hand, problems like you describe for reminders has been reported at times over months if not years.  Usually, these problems are associated with using Sync to Mobile/Web.

jr_ece

Chris_QPW said:

@jr_ece It might be an interesting thing to create a Discussion in the "Water Cooler" section asking how people if they are comfortable with their data being stored entirely on a server.  How about you do that?

My viewpoint might be inaccurate these days, but I doubt it.
Note that what people want and what is possible sometimes conflict.  As in, if the only way to download transactions is with Express Web Connect and it caches transactions on servers, most will live with that.

I'm absolutely sure that Quicken Inc and Intuit before them feel that adding these features is the only way they can grow the business (and customers certainly ask for these features), but there are two main problems with that.  The first is in almost all the cases they have not been able to provide these services in a reliable way.  And the second is really the fact that the "desktop personal finance software" market in shrinking, not growing.  To me this is their attempt to keep it alive as long as possible.

Just look they created Simplifi, would they create that if they thought Quicken was really the future?

@Chris_QPW The question is really irrelevant although it could be fun given enough time to stay in touch with the thread. As for data on servers, I can't think of a bank that doesn't already have all of our data stored on a server at a major data center hopefully with top cybersecurity features.

And, the things you pointed out at the end are precisely the point. To stay relevant in today's market I think the online features are a must. To my initial point, the "online providers" appear to be way ahead  and winning in these new categories (i.e., features work vs don't work).

JohnA

1) There’s a difference between financial data from one FI as most banks have vs a central cloud location with all FIs in one place as Quicken Cloud stores. The latter seems much more of a nightmare in case of a breach. To me, the risks including sync data corruption outweigh any benefits.

2) Online data is stored usually for a relatively short period of time. The beauty of Quicken is that it’s all in one place and you never have to worry about data being aged out.

jr_ece

JohnA said:

1) There’s a difference between financial data from one FI as most banks have vs a central cloud location with all FIs in one place as Quicken Cloud stores. The latter seems much more of a nightmare in case of a breach. To me, the risks including sync data corruption outweigh any benefits.

2) Online data is stored usually for a relatively short period of time. The beauty of Quicken is that it’s all in one place and you never have to worry about data being aged out.

@JohnA Fair points. But, I suspect most are either for it or against it (cloud storage) and probably don't know much about the security differences.

Chris_QPW

jr_ece said:

JohnA said:

1) There’s a difference between financial data from one FI as most banks have vs a central cloud location with all FIs in one place as Quicken Cloud stores. The latter seems much more of a nightmare in case of a breach. To me, the risks including sync data corruption outweigh any benefits.

2) Online data is stored usually for a relatively short period of time. The beauty of Quicken is that it’s all in one place and you never have to worry about data being aged out.

@JohnA Fair points. But, I suspect most are either for it or against it (cloud storage) and probably don't know much about the security differences.

Frankly, I doubt most people have a good grasp of all the details, and in fact all the details aren't available, Quicken Inc and Intuit hide them.  BUT there is no doubt in my mind that people have STRONG opinion about this, and most will go to great lengths to "keep their data local", even if in reality it might not be more secure.  Like I said it might be interesting to create a Discussion on it and see how people actually respond to the question.

I will tell you though there is a BIG difference between the fact that your financial institution making your finances available and Quicken/Quicken servers/aggregators (like Intuit) doing the same thing.  A failure at the financial institution is their fault, one outside of their control is going to be a very hard uphill battle to get anyone to take responsibility/get your money back.

FredArthur

Chris_QPW - Thank you for your response. You wrote, "Usually, these problems are associated with using Sync to Mobile/Web." I just recently turned that option on. I never input/update from the app. I will stop doing the Sync to Mobile/Web and burn the app. 

Fred J.

dlipetz

> @FredArthur said:
> @Chris_QPW - Thank you for your response. You wrote, "Usually, these problems are associated with using Sync to Mobile/Web." I just recently turned that option on. I never input/update from the app. I will stop doing the Sync to Mobile/Web and burn the app. 
>
> Fred J.

Yep! Sync to Mobile/Web is a data corruptor as reported in numerous threads and experienced personally on multiple occasions. Turn it off.

Data reliability and integrity is paramount. Quicken makes me very nervous considering just how long this has been broken compounded by the recent corruption issues.

JohnA

I recognize that mistakes will happen and do not condemn Quicken in mistakenly releasing the buggy release 39.17 and 39.21. What I wish they would do, however, is to streamline their communications with users so that notification of a rogue update could be sent to users quickly - the longer the wait, the more they rely on only Quicken Community, which is not used by many users, the harder it is to recover. I also wonder if Quicken Community could have a mechanism to send unsolicited announcements to all of it's users identified as using a particular product.  I would have appreciated such a notification which would have saved me a lot of work. I didn't see anything in the announcement section.

jr_ece

@JohnA Maybe we can get that from Quicken.

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/7909912/issue-user-alert-for-quicken-updates-that-have-gone-awry/p1?new=1

JohnA

Thx! Just voted for it. Hopefully more will add their votes.

jlr426

> @dalehawaii said:
> @Jim_Harman and anyone else...
>
> I was able to get back to a stable version:
>
> This is what I did following a mise en place model:* Knowing that 38.30 is relatively stable, I downloaded it via the mondo patch at https://www.quicken.com/support/update-and-patch-20182019-release-quicken-windows-subscription-product. Have that ready to go. 
> * Find a past backup file that wasn't automatically corrupted by 39.XX (and backed up by mistake). For me that was a backup from 3/4 or 3/4. If you don't have that file, look for a file that is automatically saved when you perform an upgrade such as in the Quicken>BACKUP folder...It should be listed as something like "filename-R-38.30-2022-03-dd.QDF-backup". Note where that's located. 
> * Go to the downloaded file in #1 and execute it.
> * Open Quicken and go to File>Restore a Backup File and choose the file from #2 to restore. 
> * Check your past paychecks to confirm they aren't corrupted. If they're okay, you should be good. If not, try a previous backup version, if available. On a side note, I use Microsoft OneDrive (though I pause its sync when running Quicken and turn it back on once I shut down Quicken to avoid corruption issues), and I was able to look at the version history of my backup files and grab the last version prior to this issue being introduced.  
>
> Be careful about restoring backup files too many times, as I've seen the Quicken cloud lock users out...You might want to disconnect from the internet if you have to repeat step #4 multiple times until #5 is satisfactory. 
>
> FYI, just saw a new update come down via Quicken this morning 3/12...Not sure if I should even download it. 
>
> Hope this helps...
>
> 3/12/2022 1142 PST
> Additional Update 
>
> I was able to go to the latest version (39.23). I spent about 30 minutes inspecting my balances (Net Worth vs Ending Balance, which were corrupted by 39.17) and past paychecks, and they all appear to be fine. 
>
> Note: I had stopped using Quicken Mobile/Web a while back, so the comment from @Chris_QPW further below about keeping this feature off seems reasonable to me.


Thank you, thank you thank you! I was having the issue addressed on this thread (paychecks not split correctly after the 39.21 update, so the net worth reports showed different balances than the accounts). Following the steps above worked - I downloaded the latest patch and restored the last backup from 38.30. I need to re-enter data from March 15 on, but that's minimal compared to other solutions. I appreciate your help VERY much!

JohnA

Yes, that’s the procedure. You should validate too. Then you have to reenter everything since the file date, make sure any tweaks are redone, reconcile any statements again, etc. In my case, it was over a two week period. it’s was tedious and error-prone..  Note that I restored numerous times with no problems - the trick is not to retry a restore until the delayed cloud sync from the last restore has completed.

Robert Chiarulli

JohnA said:

Yes, that’s the procedure. You should validate too. Then you have to reenter everything since the file date, make sure any tweaks are redone, reconcile any statements again, etc. In my case, it was over a two week period. it’s was tedious and error-prone..  Note that I restored numerous times with no problems - the trick is not to retry a restore until the delayed cloud sync from the last restore has completed.

Validate does not cause corruption in v 39.30?

Chris_QPW

Robert Chiarulli said:

JohnA said:

Yes, that’s the procedure. You should validate too. Then you have to reenter everything since the file date, make sure any tweaks are redone, reconcile any statements again, etc. In my case, it was over a two week period. it’s was tedious and error-prone..  Note that I restored numerous times with no problems - the trick is not to retry a restore until the delayed cloud sync from the last restore has completed.

Validate does not cause corruption in v 39.30?

Validating and repair is a "check".  What happened to me is that 39.21 messed up my data file, but it wasn't easily visible.  When I ran Validate and repair it found the problem and tried to fix it.  Instead, being able to fix it, it made it worse, and I could see it.  So, it isn't as much that Validate and repair had a problem, it was more that it ran into a problem that it couldn't fix.

That is something that people have to realize.  Validate and repair can make things worse even when it is working correctly.  It all depends on what is wrong with the data file.

JohnA

Robert Chiarulli said:

JohnA said:

Yes, that’s the procedure. You should validate too. Then you have to reenter everything since the file date, make sure any tweaks are redone, reconcile any statements again, etc. In my case, it was over a two week period. it’s was tedious and error-prone..  Note that I restored numerous times with no problems - the trick is not to retry a restore until the delayed cloud sync from the last restore has completed.

Validate does not cause corruption in v 39.30?

Not sure about 39.30 - in my case, the latest was 39.23 which doesn’t seem to have any validate problems after restoring a data file from 3/4.

Jim_Harman

To be crystal clear, Validating does not cause corruption in R39.23 IF you have already fixed the damage caused by 39.17 and 39.21 by restoring a backup.

In light of this issue, I think it would be a good idea to always do a backup before validating.

Chris_QPW

Jim_Harman said:

In light of this issue, I think it would be a good idea to always do a backup before validating.

Validate and repair always makes a backup before starting.

EDIT: it is stored in the VALIDATE folder where your data file is stored.  But note that since it always uses the name of your data file, if you do validate and repair more than once it will be overridden without asking you.

FredArthur

Regarding R39.17/R39.21 Paycheck Corruption [Edited]
I am sorry if the is a redundant question. Please confirm the following;
I am using R39.23 now but most probably did use R39.17 and R39.21
If the payroll wizard was never used there is no need to rebuild the data file from a previous backup even if transaction adds/deletions/corrections were made using [R39.17/R39.21].

Just for fun

1. I restored a backup file from Feb 28. I validated the file and many errors were found. I validated my current data file and the same errors were found. So, I believe no additional errors were introduced during the time I used [R39.17/R39.21].
2. My Net Worth and Account Balance Reports are identical. (The graphs look good.)
3. My End of Year 2021 cash flow report generated today is identical to the one generated in early Jan. 

I have numerous split transactions. What is it about the Payroll Wizard that makes those transactions different than other split transactions?

Thank you,

Fred J.

Jim_Harman

@FredArthur
From your description it sounds like you were not affected by the R39.17 and R39.21 issues.

No one outside of Quicken knows exactly how those issues trashed the Payroll Wizard transactions. From the volume of posts here, it appears that many users were affected.

davidmarketing

Thanks @Jim_Harman for all your thoughtful comments. I am a fan of Quicken but surprised with their lack of commentary on this issue.

Quicken should create a user group with the most active posters to improve the software and experience. I don't use any of the new online features because they cause issues with my data. I have been using Quicken since 1995 so my data file has some issues. I think this was a result of when they did the "conversions" each year back when you updated the software each year.

Unknown

This content has been removed.

JohnA

Jim_Harman said:

@FredArthur
From your description it sounds like you were not affected by the R39.17 and R39.21 issues.

No one outside of Quicken knows exactly how those issues trashed the Payroll Wizard transactions. From the volume of posts here, it appears that many users were affected.

I remember after one of the 39.x upgrades that there was an unusual conversion process bar when starting Quicken for the first time after the upgrade. Perhaps this process linked/overwrote all paycheck transactions to the current values in the referencing paycheck thus corrupting past paychecks. But that’s a guess. I can see why they couldn’t fix them because they lost the original valid data that was overwritten.

FredArthur

JohnA said:

Jim_Harman said:

@FredArthur
From your description it sounds like you were not affected by the R39.17 and R39.21 issues.

No one outside of Quicken knows exactly how those issues trashed the Payroll Wizard transactions. From the volume of posts here, it appears that many users were affected.

I remember after one of the 39.x upgrades that there was an unusual conversion process bar when starting Quicken for the first time after the upgrade. Perhaps this process linked/overwrote all paycheck transactions to the current values in the referencing paycheck thus corrupting past paychecks. But that’s a guess. I can see why they couldn’t fix them because they lost the original valid data that was overwritten.

Yes - I recall seeing that "process bar" as well. I wonder if the actions it took were written to a log file?

svenwells

Hello,
I was wondering if there is any progress on a fix for the Paycheck corruption issue?

JohnA

What what kind of “progress” are you looking for? The solution is to install the latest version (39.23) and restore your data file from 3/4 or earlier. There’s no way that Quicken can automatically reverse the corruption since the original valid data was overwritten when upgrading to the faulty version (earlier 39.x versions) so a restore also needs to be done. For me, I’d like to see some mechanism for Quicken to warn their users in a timely manner so any future update corruption could be addressed more quickly narrowing the restore window.

WCKJR

Went to reconcile an account my paycheck transfers to and had incorrect amount. Went to the matching transaction. The paycheck had numerous entries with symbols instead of words and I could not edit. I ran file validate and got the report the every paycheck entry ever entered had been corrupted. Never had paycheck problems with Quicken before I did the subscription.

Ron Varley

@Chris_QPW
@Jim_Harman
I am still running R38.30 and have not updated further because of the problems I have been reading about in Quicken Community. About 2 years ago there was a big problem with an update and I decided I would not update without checking community posts to see if there had been any problems. That said and reading about the problems R39.17 & R39.21 caused and that some people still have problems after updating to R39.23 I am still leary about updating to R39.23. However, most of the problems mentioned seem to have been caused by either R39.17 and/or R39.21 and somewhat continue even after updating to R39.23. The way I understand that is because one or both of those updates corrupted their file so in order to recover with R39.23 one must use a backup file that predates upgrading to either R39.17 and/or R39.21. If that is correct since I never updated to either of those and am on R38.30, should it be ok for me to update to R39.23? Do I need to do anything extra like Validate etc. I am not as savy with computers as many of you here but I have used Quicken for over 20 years and have never seen so many problems as in the last few years. Appreciate any replies. Thanks.

JohnA

You should be ok with the latest (40.93). I’ve been running since the fiasco, recovered and kept updating. It seems ok and validate works fine. YMMV.