Charles Schwab - download positions corrupts data?

Wesley Breshears

I am doing "Simple" investing when setting up a 'Brokerage' account in Quicken. When I first linked the accounts, everything looked great; the numbers matched between the Quicken and Schwab accounts (Retirement). But when I perform a global update, the account increases in value and becomes incorrect. Before doing a global update, I discovered that when I tried to "Download Positions" manually, the account became incorrect, with the same values in each account when a global update was performed. So, my assumption is during global updates, it is downloading positions.
Do you have any thoughts as to why this is occurring? My only thoughts are to return to a tracked/advanced investing account setup (not desired) or maybe not select a "Brokerage" account but select 401/401K, but I didn't think this made a difference in Quicken.
Thank you!

Quicken Kristina

Hello @Wesley Breshears,

Thank you for letting us know you're running into this problem. To assist with this, please provide more information. What do you mean by "download positions" manually? Are you importing a file from Schwab? Are you manually telling Quicken to update? Are you updating quotes?

How are the balances becoming incorrect? For example, is it acting like it's double counting some information?

I look forward to your response!

Wesley Breshears

I am first linking or syncing to Schwab. Everything matches at this point. But when perform global sync (all other accounts) or a secondary sync it becomes incorrect. It appears that it downloads positions during the.gloabal or secondary sync. I can also just request to download positions without syning again. All three actions types alters the value of the account, typically by the same number but there is a few times if I keep repeating the sync or download positions, it will increase again. Since I am doing simple investing, I can't really tell what is being altered or added to the account.

Quicken Kristina

Thank you for your reply,

When did this behavior first start? Has this been happening ever since the account was added? Do any of your other accounts transfer funds to/from the Schwab account? If they do, are there any reminders set up for these transfers?

Thank you!

Wesley Breshears

Not sure, we only switched recently to Simple Investing, so not sure if has always been an issue. We use to do Detailed Investing, but over time would become inaccurate because splits or past stock price entry was needed and we didn't know strike price when executed. Both my Wife's account and mine become corrupt after positions get downloaded, so not a single account issue. It either, Schwab on how they are passing Data or Quicken getting consmfused, but when Positions get downloaded all accounts become incorrect.

Quicken Kristina

Thank you for your reply,

When you switched to Simple Investing, did you switch the existing accounts, or did you re-add the accounts as new?

Thank you!

Wesley Breshears

I did both, and the same effect every time.

Quicken Kristina

Thank you for your reply,

When your accounts update, does the information about the positions still reflect correctly (quantity of shares and current price, for example), even though the account value is incorrect? Are only certain holdings affected?

Do you have Sync turned on? To check, please navigate to Edit>Preferences>Mobile & Web. If Sync is on, it will look like the sample image below.

Thank you!

Wesley Breshears

I am not using mobile sync, but I finally resolved the issue anyway.

Initially, when I sync with Charles Schwab when doing "Simple Investing," cash is not identified as a security. Then, when an update or download of positions action is triggered, Charles Schwab creates a Security Listing called "USD", Type = Cash, and then creates a Price History transaction against that security. The problem is that the Price History transaction gets created with what appears to be a random Price value, but the Volume is always the current cash amount in the account. So, in my case, instead of Price = $1.00 x Volume = 0, it is Price = $12649.64 x Volume=49.84. So my account is adding $630,458.06 vs. $12,649.64. I had many incorrect Price History transactions, one every time I synced, but the Price always appeared to be the current cash amount in the account at the time of syncing. About two years ago, I had a couple of Price History records set to $1.00 and zero volume. I have no clue where the Volume amount is being determined/calculated. Once I deleted all the past Price History records and my final one was listed as Price = $1.00 and Volume = 0, all my Schwab Accounts showed the correct values.

I never had this problem when doing "Detailed Investing" with Charles Schwab in the prior years, and I haven't investigated whether Price History records are generated when positions are downloaded, but it appears to be an issue when setting up a Simple Investing account.

Thanks for your help.

Quicken Kristina

Thank you for the follow-up,

I'm glad to hear you resolved the issue. Thank you for sharing the solution!

If you need further assistance, please feel free to reach out!

Scott

I just got moved to Schwab from Fidelity (employer did it). Trying to add it to Quicken and the results are a mess. Looking like the data coming in is corrupt. I've seen this happen between Quicken and Fidelity before. Is there a similar issue happening here?