Re: Community Discussion: I have to say I'm getting weary of all the download problems

On 10/30/24 7:09 PM, Arthur Conan Doyle wrote:

> John Pollard <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
>> Hopefully the newest Connection Method (Express Web Connect+) will go a
>> long way toward providing complete/accurate Quicken downloads at a price
>> most financial institutions will find affordable. I believe it's cheaper
>> than Direct Connect (the original gold standard Connection Method), but
>> potentially just as reliable.

> IIRC, EWC+ is not a Quicken (or Intuit) unique protocol. 

I agree - I hope I didn't leave any other impression.

Direct Connect/Web Connect/Express Web Connect use the OFX (Open 
Financial Exchange) specs, which were developed by Intuit and Microsoft 
along with many financial institutions.

EWC+ uses the newer FDX (Financial Data Exchange) specs.

A lot of big name (and smaller) financial institutions have signed up 
for FDX - which costs money - so it appears they're serious about it.

https://tinyurl.com/y7weh8s8


> Many financial institutions offer access to accounts held at other organizations. > They'd like their users to consider them their primary financial 
portal ...

True. But I would caution anyone from rushing into this approach.

 > and showing other user accounts helps make that relationship sticky.

Too "sticky", I think.

> The use of security tokens over user web credentials is also a major security
> improvement. 

And that also means no more need for 2FA for downloading (as typically 
now required for many EWC downloads).

> At some point FIs may take active measures to block screen scaping
> (i.e. like removing the invisible tags Quicken and others use to identify
> specific data fields.
> Hopefully this will encourage more wide spear adoption of EWC+.

Based on my information and experience so far, I agree.

Sadly, I'm not sure the "conversion" is moving very fast. There have 
been problems reported by users switching to EWC+ (though I have had 
very few of those problems myself), but I'm hoping the cause(s) of those 
problems have been found and fixed now.

I believe adding the capability to send bill pay instructions from 
Quicken to the financial institution using EWC+ would help convince more 
users to push for EWC+.