Password vault passwords are missing

Question

I use Quicken weekly to reconcile accounts.  Last Saturday May 14th everything worked normally.   I made a manual backup of the file like I always do.

Today May 21 Quicken started normally but all my bank account passwords are gone.   Using Tools, Password Vault, Add or Enter Passwords I see only 3 accounts instead of 15.

If I open the backup from when I finished working May 14, the Password Vault is complete.

Can anybody tell me what happened and how to prevent it from happening again?  I assume--this being Quicken--that this is an intermittent bug that we have to live with.

John16 · Answer

Thanks to all who on my problem and offered suggestions.

UKR · Answer

The Password Vault is part of your active Quicken data file and cannot be backed up or otherwise stored separately. What you could do is to print the Vault with passwords showing in clear text.
But, with Express Web Connect - accounts now storing their passwords in a Quicken server (so that the server can go out daily and obtain transactions for you), that's mostly moot. Do be sure to store bank passwords elsewhere, securely.
Accounts available with Direct Connect, IMHO, should be left in Direct Connect mode. That works best, especially for investment accounts. Of course, if the bank starts charging you for Direct Connect, fall back to Express Web Connect may be the only alternative. Don't forget to inform the bank that you no longer use Direct Connect and they need to stop charging you.

John16 · Answer

When I used the all-accounts one step update, the account list asked for the password for all accounts that were Direct Connect.  Most of my accounts were direct connect.  The Express Web Connects accounts were not affected, I assume because their passwords are not stored in the Password Vault.

I converted most of the Direct Connect accounts to Express Web Connects without difficulty although Quicken stopped responding each time for up to 2-minutes.  But I've learned that when Quicken appears to lock up, just let it be and usually it will start again in a couple minutes.

Unfortunately, a few businesses like Chase Bank do not support Express Web Connect and so I have to stay with Direct Connect and depend on the password vault remaining uncorrupted.

The BIG problem with reinitializing a Direct Connect connection is that the first download pulls 18 months of transactions.  Chase recognizes and matches transactions already in the ledger so it's not a big deal.

But for the brokerages Edward Jones and TD Ameritrade Quicken fails to match old transactions so they must be manually deleted.  Because I have mostly dividend-paying holdings, some that pay monthly, this means each account has Hundreds of transactions to be deleted.

I am not pleased.

If anyone could tell me how to back up the password vault I'd appreciate it.  But I expect there is not a way to do that.