My bank feed stopped working
Why feeds break, how to reconnect without duplicating or losing activity, and how to keep the close on schedule while it is down.
How-toFor Bookkeepers, Business owners
Why feeds break
| Cause | Sign | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Credentials changed | Sync stopped on the day you changed your banking password. | Reconnect the account. |
| Consent expired | Sync stopped with no change on your side. | Reconnect. Many institutions require periodic re-authorization. |
| Multi-factor prompt | The connection is waiting on a challenge. | Reconnect and complete the challenge. |
| Institution maintenance | Several accounts at one bank stopped together. | Usually resolves. Import a statement to cover the gap. |
| Account changed at the bank | The account was renumbered or migrated. | Reconnect and confirm it is mapped to the right account in Books. |
Covering the gap without duplicating
- 1
Note the date of the last transaction that arrived.
- 2
Import a statement CSV covering from a few days before that date to today.
Overlap deliberately. Duplicate detection handles overlaps; nothing handles gaps.
- 3
Check the skipped-as-duplicate count on the import result.
It should roughly equal the overlap. A count of zero means detection did not match, and you should check for duplicates before categorizing.
- 4
Reconnect the feed.
- 5
After the first successful sync, verify the boundary days.
Compare a few days either side of the gap against the statement. This is where duplicates hide.
Common questions
Feeds run behind the institution, often by a day or more, and some transactions only appear once they settle rather than while pending. If activity is more than a few days behind, treat it as a broken connection.
It happens, usually when a pending transaction settles at a different amount. Delete the uncategorized duplicate; if both were categorized, recategorize one to reverse it.
Pending authorizations often settle at a different amount — a restaurant tip, a fuel pre-authorization. Reconcile against the settled amount on the statement, which is authoritative.
Was this useful?