Unable to synchronize two user accounts from the same institution
There is a problem with Simplifi's connection when attempting to sync between two accounts from some institutions. This is the case when multiple signins/logins must be used. In my case I have a username for my credit union containing my deposit checking account, savings, and loans. My wife and I have a second username at the same credit union for our joint checking account used for spending.
What happens is: adding one user account works successfully, and the data for all the banking accounts (checking shares, loans, etc) for that user account synchronize. However, this connection is broken once a second user account is added. Attempting to authenticate the first account again then causes the second one to fail.
I scoured the internet for solutions, trying everything I've found in the community and Reddit, but to no avail. For example, this 15 month old post, has the suggestion of setting up each account in a separate browser to keep them from getting confused:
So, I did. I used Firefox, logged into Simplifi, and connected Account A. Waited an hour. Used Chrome, logged into Simplifi, and connected Account B. Things seemed ok, but when I checked back a few hours later: they had both fallen out of sync again. I've tried using two different devices. I even tried using the webapp for one and the iOS app for another. I followed other advice, and with great precaution, such as marking the accounts manual, waiting a day, linking the first, waiting a day, and finally linking the second.
From what I've found, it is a fairly common problem and hasn't been resolved. This is a shame, because other products (that use Plaid), Credit Karma (which is terrible), and Mint (which is dead) all support multiple accounts from the same institution properly. The other software I'm forced into due to this issue is going 2 months strong without a reauthentication. Here are some of the posts from the many folks in the community who have this problem, but in all of these cases Quicken/Simplifi support seem to not understand the problem, there is a specific workaround (like with choosing a Store Card vs a Banking account type for an institution such as Chase), or the user abandons the discussion before the problem is fully addressed:
And here is a very similar issue regarding retirement accounts:
The Chase workaround described in some of the comments to posts above offers insight, I think. Somewhere in the Simplifi or data broker software the concept of an institution and a user account is conflated. It's as if an authentication token, session, or whatever is being held for that institution as defined within Simplify and/or the data broker; but it should be held for the unique institution-and-user-account pairing. Thus, the most recently added is likely being used for all of them and only succeeds for the correct one. By having the user "lie" and say their second Chase account is actually a Spacely Sprockets store card works because there is now a unique "institution" model to hold the authentication data/state for each distinct user account. Even though, ultimately, they are authenticating to the same institution in real life. I'm fairly confident this could be mitigated if this data was held per institution-user-account instead of per institution OR there was some form of sandboxing around the communication processes that the problem could be resolved OR Simplifi could support Plaid as a data broker since they figured out a way to do it properly.
Thank you, I do hope the resources will be put into resolving this for good, and that I would be able to ditch the other software that I don't even enjoy but at least links.
Comments
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Hello @RFC793,
Thanks for reaching out! To clarify, you and your wife have multiple logins at the same financial institution, and you are unable to link the secondary login due to the first login becoming disconnected, correct? Can you let us know what financial institution that is?
Additionally, can you provide screenshots showing the issue with the connection breaking after adding the secondary user account? This would be helpful in determining a solution.
Thanks,
Coach Jon
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Thank you @Coach Jon. I just messaged you directly with the information you requested.
To clarify: I can link the secondary login just fine. The problem is that the they will fail once the accounts attempt to synchronize again.
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Hello @RFC793,
Thanks for the information. I would try the following with a fresh new connection for both accounts to see if this will work for you:
- Make all of the accounts manual by following the steps here.
- Once you see all of the accounts listed in the Manual Accounts section under Settings, go back through the Add Account flow to reconnect to the bank using your login credentials.
- Carefully link the accounts found to your existing Quicken Simplifi accounts by following the steps here.
- Repeat steps 2 and 3 using your secondary credentials.
Please let us know if that works for you!
Thanks,
Coach Jon
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I stated in my post that I had tried to: "marking the accounts manual, waiting a day, linking the first, waiting a day, and finally linking the second." Upon linking the second, it began to fail upon the next sync attempt. I will, however, try this exercise again and report back.
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@Coach Jon - I want to make sure we are being very precise here. You do not mention deleting the institution accounts in your instructions. I presume I should remove both accounts between Steps #1 and #2. Cheers.
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Hello @RFC793,
Thanks for the replies. Unless you want to add the accounts as brand-new accounts and lose whatever history you may have in Quicken Simplifi for those accounts, I would suggest not removing them. The instructions I gave you allow you to link to the original accounts once a successful connection has occurred.
I hope this clears up any confusion.
-Coach Jon
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Anecdotal evidence. I remember trying a bunch of things to get this to work. One step that I vaguely remember helping to solve the issue was how the account was added. Adding the account from the box that already contained the other, previous account lead to errors. However, navigating to the top of the page, and starting from scratch with that add account, worked.
It sounds like you may have tried this already, but just wanted to put that out there as a potential solution. Agreed that it's super frustrating how often this comes up.
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Done. We will see what it looks like in the morning.
@Coach Jon - Sorry, I didn't mean "accounts". I mean to remove the two (now empty) institutions. I did do this just to clean the slate.
@nfgreen - Thanks for the suggestion. I followed that route per your advice, which is consistent with steps included in the "Add Account" article the coach recommended.
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@Coach Jon - Checked Simplifi first thing this morning. Same behavior: I got the autentication dialogs almost immediately.
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@RFC793, thanks for the updates!
When viewing the information you sent to Coach Jon via DM, it looks like you just need to complete MFA with the bank. Clicking the 'X' to close out of the MFA dialog is going to result in an FDP-185 error. In order for the accounts to stay connected without error, you'll want to complete MFA each time you're prompted to do so. If you're being prompted for MFA for both sets of credentials, this indicates to me that both sets of accounts are connected.
As for deleting institutions, if you have empty Financial Institutions (by empty, I mean no accounts under them) listed below the Manual Accounts section in Settings > Accounts, you can delete these. Leaving them or deleting them should have no impact on connecting the actual accounts to the bank. You will not want to delete the actual accounts or the connected Financial Institution, however, as this will cause you to lose historical data.
I hope this helps!
-Coach Natalie
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@Coach Natalie - I chose to "X" out of them in the screenshot I shared so that you can see the current error message shown in the institution / account listing. If I completed the prompt, then it would have resolved the message and I wouldn't be able to share it. Otherwise, I complete the MFA prompt every time. For instance:
- I had to complete the MFA twice per institution last night when reading/linking per @Coach Jon's request. At this point, the accounts synced.
- This morning I completed the MFAs again since it failed again overnight. After which, the accounts synced
- Now that I am looking at the app again: I have the MFA dialogs once again.
That is the crux of the problem I am reporting. If the institution is being used for two user logins, then you end up in a never ending cycle of MFA login dialogs. Yes, they do successfully "connect" and sync information. But they only do so once, and then are left unable to periodically poll for new information. At that point, they are in an error state and require the user to interactively complete MFA again.
If I only have one instance of the institution then everything works fine: I'm not required to reenter a code nearly every time I use the app or visit the webapp.
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@RFC793, thanks for confirming the issue!
We don't have any control over the MFA requests, as these are made and managed by the bank directly. Our support article here has more info on this:
Additionally, since the error code is an FDP-185 error, and we have determined that it's being caused by not completing MFA, this is to be expected. You have to complete MFA when prompted by the bank or you will go into an error state. With that, when you say that you "end up in a never ending cycle of MFA login dialogs", do you mean that you are continually prompted in a single session and the MFA never completes, or do you mean that you are prompted with each Quicken Simplifi session?
Please let us know!
-Coach Natalie
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I respectfully have my doubts about the bank policy hypothesis for my case. Simplifi works fine (at least for days) if I only have one instance of that institution. The two competitor products I use (it seems the names are banned in comments? but they both use Plaid as the data broker) work with multiple instances for weeks on end without ever having to reauthenticate. If my banking institution has a strict policy regarding reauthenticating, then all three products I am currently using should be affected, and they should be affected similarly regardless of using one or many user accounts for that institution.
I believe the symptom of an MFA prompt specifically is a red herring. I used to have to re-enter my login credentials, like many people in the posts I shared originally. The issue can be summarized as: "Users of Simplifi must reauthenticate many times a day when using multiple logins to the same institution. Whereas that institution can remain connected without reauthentication for at least an order of days when only one user login is in use." Combined with the fact other apps are working fine leads me to believe that Simplifi (or Intuit, the broker) gets "confused" when this institution is used with multiple login accounts, which breaks the user's stored authentication/authorization, and causes the bank to force a reauth.
Regarding "every refresh", if this is referring to the "Refresh" button on the left sidebar (or circular arrow on the top right of the dashboard in the iOS app, I think those are the same), then: "no". I do not have to reauth each time I click or tap that. In fact, I can auth on my laptop then refresh on the iOS app or vice-versa. However, I don't know if it is actually successfully pulling any new data. But, if I go about my day, check the app a few hours later, I'll have to reauth. Which then (and it seems only then) causes new data to load for those accounts.
I really like Simplifi; I like it better than the other 2 solutions I am using currently. But, it is the only one out of the pack with this issue; which unfortunately is a showstopper for me. And I'm not the only one: from the posts I shared, the theme is "Single login works, multiple logins don't work" and this is across 8 named institutions.
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@RFC793, thanks for the reply!
I'm not sure where the issue may lie, we just know that MFA requests are managed by the banks and we can't do anything to change them from our end. The only thing we can suggest is disabling MFA with the bank to avoid being prompted in Quicken Simplifi, but I am aware that doing so may pose a security risk. At any rate, it may be a limitation with our service provider (Intuit) or with the bank itself. Personally, I manually track my Chase account in Quicken Classic because I'm unable to have it linked in both Quicken Simplifi and Quicken Classic (which resulted in having to reauthorize my account every time I refreshed in either program), and this is definitely a limitation of Chase's OAuth API.
Sorry for not having better news for you!
-Coach Natalie
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Am I correct in understanding that this isn't going to be filed as an issue or anything?
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@RFC793, based on what you're reporting, no, there is nothing to file as an issue from our end since the connection is working, and MFA is controlled by the bank.
Sorry for not having a solution for you!
-Coach Natalie
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But MFA is not overbearing when I only keep one connection to the bank. There is a problem when there are two connections to the bank, and it only happens in Simplifi (not in other apps). The issue to file is:
"Customer experiences multiple disconnections leading to subsequent MFA authentication requests daily when there are two instances of an institution configured. With only one instance of the institution, the connection can remain intact for a week or longer without the need to reauthenticate. Expected behavior: two instances of the institution should behave the same as one instance with regard to maintaining a connection and reauthentications."
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