Fidelity balances in Quicken for Mac are not recorded properly

Sean Franklin
Sean Franklin Quicken Mac Subscription Member ✭✭
edited January 18 in Download, Add/Update Accounts (Mac)

I've had an ongoing issue with my Fidelity NetBenefits 401(k) for a while now. I've read this announcement which states that after entering an adjustment, "you will be good to go." That doesn't seem to be the case.

I've deleted & re-downloaded the entire account several times, most recently this morning. Every two weeks, I have contributions from my paycheck and my employer match, and those result in "Buys" of the various funds. The problem is, the "funds" for the purchase seem to come from the account balance of this account - meaning the longer I let it go, the "Negative" cash balance continues accruing. If I enter an "Adjustment" as suggested by the announcement, that does bring my net cash balance to zero - but after the next contribution it starts working its way down again.

Deleting & recreating the account does result in a "Zero" cash balance, but it does so via a "Live Opening Balance" adjustment from a couple of years prior - not due to any sort of correct accounting. Yes, my cash balance is now zero - on the assumption that I started with $132,591.40 via some hand-waving in January 2024! ALL of the purchases since then, "come out" of that balance - the contributions I and my employer have made since then, are ignored.

Is anyone else seeing this? Is there some feature that I'm missing, or is this just an artifact of how the data is downloaded that needs to be fixed between Fidelity and Quicken?

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Comments

  • Quicken Kristina
    Quicken Kristina Quicken Windows Subscription Moderator mod

    Hello @Sean Franklin,

    Thank you for reaching out! Since the steps in the annoucement are only a temporary fix, I recommend that you contact Quicken Support directly for further assistance, as they have access to tools we can't access on the Community and they're able to escalate the issue as needed. The Quicken Support phone number can be found through this link here. Phone support is available from 5:00 am PT to 5:00 pm PT, Monday through Friday. Note - Support will be closed tomorrow, 19 Jan 26, in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

    I apologize that I could not be of more assistance! 

    Quicken Kristina

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  • John_in_NC
    John_in_NC Quicken Mac Subscription SuperUser, Mac Beta Beta

    Hi, @Sean Franklin

    I am not seeing any issues with my Fidelity NetBenefits account, and perhaps this is a part user interpretation/confusion or how you have things setup.

    Yes, the 401k balance should be $0 after all your recent paycheck fund "buys". If you simply download transactions from Fidelity, there should be an initial placeholder for cash (and for MFs share balances as well if this 401k predates 1/2024) that "adjusts" everything so your final cash and share balances are correct at the time of each download. And that initial cash balance adjustment should keep growing each pay period as you make more mutual fund purchases each pay period. The balance should return to $0 after each pay periods buys. Are you not seeing that?

    Now, you didn't make it clear if you have your paycheck setup (usually as a split transaction) showing transfers in of your/employer contributions into the 401k account. While optional, that is what I do: I show what I and my employer contribute, and this raises the cash balance above $0. Then, when the subsequent buys occur, the balance returns to $0.

    You shouldn't have to be making manual balance adjustments.

  • invest101
    invest101 Quicken Mac Subscription Member
    edited February 10

    I am 100% having the exact same issue. Did the same steps and the issue persists. Thank you for taking the time to articulating this.

  • Sean Franklin
    Sean Franklin Quicken Mac Subscription Member ✭✭

    Thanks for the tip about entering paycheck contributions, John. That is helpful, but it doesn't actually resolve the overall issue.

    When I download transactions from Fidelity, I'll have several "Buys" and several "Sells." But regardless if it's a "Buy" or a "Sell" Quicken is treating it as a Buy! So as an example yesterday there was a "Sell" of 5 different securities, and a "Buy" of 2 others that all "Should" have resulted in a $0 cash balance (selling $9,243.92 worth of 5 securities and buying $9,243.92 worth of two others). But in Quicken, the "Invest Amt" column shows POSITIVE for all seven transactions, meaning my cash balance goes down by $18,487.84!

    If I manually add in my own "Sell" transactions formatted EXACTLY like the downloaded ones, they show a Negative "Invest Amt" for sells and positive for buys, and everything ends up as it should.

    I have (again) completely deleted and re-added Fidelity, because the quantities of the various funds had drifted to the point it wasn't showing an accurate overall value. After doing that I (correctly) show $0 cash balance, and I now have correct quantities and values of the various funds. But looking at the history, again, it's showing a starting balance of over $150,000 in March 2024 and ALL of the "Buys" and "Sells" are coming out of that as Buys.

    This is Quicken Classic Mac Version 8.4.2, on macOS v26.3.

  • John_in_NC
    John_in_NC Quicken Mac Subscription SuperUser, Mac Beta Beta

    Hi again, @Sean Franklin

    A few things:

    In the future, if your download includes transactions that should be of a type Sell and not Buy, do not edit yet: Please navigate via the menubar Help:Report a Problem and submit the file/logs and note the problem. This is the only way that Quicken has a proof to push back to Intuit (their data provider) that what you are getting is wrong. You shouldn't have to fix this manually each time.

    After you have done this, then you can fix the transactions that have already downloaded as any future fixes won't impact what has already hit your file. If you edit those transaction, you can easily change the Buy to a type of Sell, via the popup, and it will simply reverse the sign on the transaction without your having to manually recreate the transactions.

    That said, most people don't have many Sell transactions in a 401k unless doing 401k fund conversions or if you had to take RMDs, etc. I don't know your situation.

    As for the account having a Placeholder for $150K around 3/2024, that makes sense: when you completely recreated the account, Fidelity only provided you with 2 years of historical data and it used those Placeholders (balance adjustments) for cash and securities at that point in 2024.

    Please submit logs if you continue to see this.

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