Schwablink transaction import creating duplicates

[crawfordn]

Hi Mark,
I seem to have developed an odd problem. When I import trades from Schwab, I am getting the proper trade with the proper date, indicating that it was imported, and a second entry with the date of the import, not the trade, without the indication that it was imported. All this results in a double purchase with the corresponding double withdrawal from the cash account. I have played with all of the import options with no luck. Any ideas what obvious item I am overlooking. Thanks, Rick

[Mark]

Hi Rick,

Do you mean that when you look in the "Preview Importing Transactions" dialog you see the same transaction listed twice, once with the correct transaction date, and a second copy with the current date? If so, I'm not sure why this would happen. I'd suggest opening up the transaction file you're importing, and taking a look. Do you see the transaction listed twice in there? The transaction file is just an ASCII file you can view with any text editor, like Notepad.

Are you importing a single file, or all files in a folder? It might be easier to debug the problem if you only import a single file, so you can see better where the duplicate transactions are coming from.

[crawfordn]

Hi Mark,
I am only importing one file, the .trn file, and the transactions appear only once in the preview. Once imported, however, they appear twice, once with the trade date and once with the import date. There are also two corresponding cash account entries. I'm perplexed. Could this somehow be related to the automatic corresponding cash account entries? Rick

[Mark]

Hi Rick,

If you only see 1 transaction in the "Preview" dialog, then you are only importing that transaction currently. If you have 2 transactions after the import, then the first one was there before the import.

I'd suggest exiting without saving, and then try the import again. Before doing the import, look at the transactions already in the investment. During the import, look at the Preview window closely to see what you're importing. After the import, you should only have added what was in the Preview dialog.

You can exit without saving by turning off "Options / Save Investments On Exit", exiting Fund Manager, and answering "No" when it asks if you want to save.

[crawfordn]

Mark,
I'll give that a try, but I believe the duplicate is being created after the import somehow. The duplicate, that doesn't indicate that it was imported, always has the later date of the date of the import. It is as though I manually reentered the trade after I had imported it. I'll report back tomorrow. Rick

[Mark]

Hi Rick,

Okay, let me know how it goes. If it is something you can reproduce please let me know.

[crawfordn]

Hi Mark,
Not only have I reproduced the problem, I think I may have zeroed in on the culprit. I did import a trade (buy) from Schwab this morning and it did create two entries. the first being correct and the second being a purchase at the same price with today's date, no fee, and no memo. When I think about it, it is only happening when the security is new to the account and I have it set to "create a new investment when needed", not automatically, but through the prompt. At the prompt, the number of shares and price are entered. Is this creating the second trade entry? I suspect it is. I have changed back to not creating a new investment, which I will do manually.

[Mark]

Hi Rick,

Yes, this would explain it. If you want to use the manual method of creating new investments, please leave the "Opening Data" set to 0 shares. Entering a non-zero share starting balance will indeed record a purchase of that number of shares on the specified opening date (which defaults to the current date). This would be in addition to any transactions that are importing.