Ability to auto-backup and restore data (edited)

asubbaiyanprof · August 2021

@Coach Natalie opening an idea post to create an auto-backup feature and option to restore it as well; today, the payee rule overwrote multiple years worth of payee information for reasons unknown to me, and this would be helpful to restore to the previous state

DannyB · September 2022

I am going to do some "remodeling" of my Savings Goals that will entail deleting some exiting SGs and creating some new SGs. This "remodel" is due to some rethinking and rearranging of my budget as a result of working with Simplifi this since January 2022.

I was just on my Savings Goal page and hovering over "delete" for one of my SGs and thought to myself how it would be best to backup my existing Simplifi data base first but I doubted that that was possible in the current version. Sure enough I did a search of the Support page... nothing about backups there. Signed into Chat to ask on of support staff. Chatted with Coach Aura and she confirmed there is not backup feature currently for Simplifi. Searched this forum and found this Feature Request and added my vote.

The ability to maintain an automatic and routinely updated backup of our dB would be nice. I'm guessing Simplifi maintains a backup of the whole data base that is kept up to date, or at least I hope Simplifi does!

@Coach Natalie I don't see a "promote" button for the above initial post. If I click on the promote button in my post how will that affect this original feature request post?

Coach Natalie · September 2022

Great question, @DannyB!

Using the "Promote" option on a comment doesn't impact the post; this option is for the comment specifically and will give the person who made the comment 5 points. More details on this can be found here. Just adding a comment to this Idea post, however, will bump it to the top of Recent Discussions, which should give it more visibility.

-Coach Natalie

TommyMac · September 2022

I agree, there should be a way to do a local backup of our data.

jeffbobpdx · November 2022

Please make this available ASAP. It's a pain in the butt to go through the entire system, update the Payee rules, Bill rules, Calendar rules, etc., etc. and then lose it all because of something stupid.

jeffbobpdx · November 2022

There needs to be a way to backup your data on a regular basis and manually. I'm not talking about doing just an export of the transactions; we need to be able to backup the entire configuration like the Renaming Rules, Reminders, Calendar, Spending Plan, etc. This is a huge thing that's missing.

RobWilk · November 2022

I presume that as a cloud service, they are running regular backups.

Flopbot · November 2022

Maybe an assurance from @Coach Natalie would be helpful here. Even if they do, I’d still appreciate a way to back it up locally.

Coach Natalie · November 2022

Hello All,

Great question!

It is my understanding that Simplifi does not back up data to the point of being able to restore it. Even our Product Team is unable to restore data for users from our end. Once a change is made, that change gets synced to the cloud, and that is the data that is now stored on the cloud; there is no backup point for prior data.

I hope this helps!

-Coach Natalie

Flopbot · November 2022

Make my vote +2 then.

meoge · December 2022

We just accidently changed all categories for a certain payee to "gifts" by accident. I had to manually go through and fix all the entries. Thankfully we are somewhat new to Simplify (June 2022) so our data only goes back to March. I now realize this is a major shortcoming. With Quicken, it backed up our database and kept the last 10 copies. We then kept those around for 2 months. It saved me so much work on more than one occasion. If we made this same mistake 1 year from now I would have to leave the bad data. There really should be some way to restore to a snapshot or backup of some kind.

ajbopp · March 2023

I'd like to request the ability to create a snapshot of my Simplfi configuration that I can use to undo some changes that didn't have the expected result. For instance, I did something that caused a dozen savings goals to get propagated into the future, even though I thought I had deleted them all several months ago. Still not sure what I did, but it would have been nice to have some sort of undo function. I still cuddle with how I have this set up quite often, and unexpected results would be nice be able to erase.

Coach Natalie · March 2023

Hello @ajbopp,

Thanks for posting your request to the Community!

We have a couple of existing requests surrounding the ability you're requesting for you to take a look at:

https://community.simplifimoney.com/discussion/2289/undo-option

[removed link to merged thread]

Does either of these requests meet your needs? If so, I can merge your request and vote count with the most applicable existing request. 🙂

-Coach Natalie

ajbopp · March 2023

@Coach Natalie Yes, this is exactly what I had in mind.

ps56k · November 2023

yeah - I think a checkpoint backup and user restore would be a helpful safeguard -

Safeguard against Quicken Simplifi really messing up our data files … and also the classic user error of modifying something and messing up all their data

AwesomeSalamander · December 2023

+1 I agree.

Mach1Pony · March 2024

You can spend many weeks getting all your info just right and lose it with one small mistake. We don't need to create backups, but snapshots. We need the ability to revert a snapshot to a point in time. How hard can that be?

IKnowURider · June 2024

100% agree… I've been there with one slip up changing hundreds of transactions with no way to revert. If there is an existing "Undo" function that pops up after a rule change (albeit briefly in a less than prominent location), seems at a minimum it seems a short programming hop to ensure the undo functionality be altered to last longer and appear front and center. This thread started almost 3 years ago… is anyone listening?

But the bigger point of being able to create a backup file/restore point would be a massive help. Years ago I had Quicken for the desktop, and I could create a daily backup file automatically. I don't need or want the full version. I like the simplicity and cleanliness of Simplifi. But, I'd like to make a substantial change to the categories, and any single change I make has permanent and irrevocable consequences and next to no margin for error.

Membername · November 2024

agree, just deleted an account and lost all the historical transactions. I figured I could get them from the bank but they only loaded 90 days. This makes Simplifi useless to me. They could at least warn us that some banks only go back 90 days before we delete a credit card. Or a backup checkpoint would work

John Wells · March 15

I have been using Quicken (now called Quicken Classic) since the DOS and dial-up modems days. I began in November to use Simplifi simultaneously with Classic, since it was so cheap on special, with the idea that I might convert to only Simplifi when my Classic subscription ends in October. I confess there are some features I have come to really like about Simplifi and its approach to budgeting and personal financial management. But the "deal breaker" looms that I cannot conceive of not "owning" a backup of my data, that could be restored to a fresh, blank Simplifi account . . . on my PC hard drive. Not having this capability would be financially irresponsible (I am a retired corporate finance professional). I would love, and hope this feature will be added before October, otherwise I will somewhat reluctantly press on with Quicken Classic only.

MikeBtp · March 15

I also agree that a backup and restore option should be added ASAP. I just realized that there isn't an automatic backup or even a manual option. This should be a high priority feature and I'm surprised that Quicken has not done anything for this since they were very good about it with their desktop classic app. Please add this necessary feature.

Mayra · March 15

so if I want to backup my files I would be using Quicken Classic instead. Don't suggest things that would change the way Simplifi makes it simple. <3

Flopbot · March 15

@Mayra ,

You’re correct that if having a backup copy (i.e. a restore point) is a deal breaker for you, your main option is switching to Quicken Classic.

SRC54 · June 28

We need to upvote this feature request. It would be great to have a restore point for Simplifi.

nrp06 · August 9

https://community.simplifimoney.com/discussion/comment/12055#Comment_12055

They are not. I know people who lost significant data with no solution in sight.

Flopbot · August 13

@nrp06 and @RobWilk

To be clear, I suspect Simplifi does do regular backups for something catastrophic - everyone’s data disappears all at once. They don’t currently offer us any mechanism for falling back on these backups on an individual account basis. Functionally for us users, this equates to “no regular backups”.

RobWilk · August 13

@Flopbot I've definitely heard of them restoring one-user's backups here in the forums before.

I do not know what criteria they offer for deciding to restore.

I should've tried that after my May→Late July "Experiences". Too late now, i recreated everything fresh.

Flopbot · August 13

@RobWilk interesting, I’ve never noticed this.

matthew.martin_x · September 28

I upgraded my iPhone from a 15 to 17 and afterwards Simplifi was not able to reconnect to the Apple wallet accounts. This feature is the only reason I use Simplifi and the reason I moved to Simplifi from Quicken Classic

I worked to resolve this for a long time with Quicken support eventually the only solution that I found was to uninstall and reinstall Simplifi on my new iPhone.

I had to delete the Apple Wallet connection and accounts, and re-add it on the iPhone 17, which overwrote years of enrichments to the expense information with the plain original bank entries. I lost all of the modifications I had made to thousands of entries, including all the splits, categorizations, tags, renaming, everything. It also broke the transfers between accounts.

What an infuriating failure for this product. It is going to take weeks for me to accomplish even a partial recovery of this information.

Please add the ability to store daily snapshots on the web that can be rolled back. If this isn’t possible, please add the ability to export backups that could be re-imported. This capability is just essential.

I should mention that I didn’t try one technique that might have worked to successfully migrate the data. I could have restored my iPhone 15, then made the Apple accounts manual there, then transferred to the new iPhone 17 and tried reconnecting the accounts. That might have worked. I wish I had known about that before I traded in my old iPhone. If this works, you should notify your customers.

RobWilk · September 28

The solution 'should' have been (if everything worked right) mark the existing apple wallet account as manual rather than deleting it, then relink (when re-connecting to apple wallet) the apple wallet account to the existing manual account.

However, I think you'll find an existing request for backups, probably with more votes. I'm looking for it now: [removed link to merged thread]

SRC54 · September 28

I think it is worth reiterating to everyone what Rob says here:

Never DELETE an account unless you truly want to lose all those transactions. Make the account manual. Even if you cannot reconnect it for some reason, you'll have your data.

And also be aware that deleting a bank (or FI) in Account Settings will delete any associated accounts. I learned this the hard way when I was a newbie!

I am sorry this happened to you Matthew, and hope you are on the way to rebuilding your data.

Ability to auto-backup and restore data (edited)

Active · Last Updated August 2021

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