Bank of America and Q06

You're not going to be able to determine the correct answer by asking what download method others are using for BofA: BofA will download via web-connect for free for any customer; direct downloads either cost a monthly fee, or require certain account types with minimum balance requirements. Your specific situation will dictate which method you can use (those who qualifiy for direct connect, can still elect to utilize web-connect).

You absolutely must select the correct financial institution to assign to your Quicken account; if you do not already know, ask the bank. They can also help you with other matters relating to setting up downloads from them. BofA should have a separate tech-support toll-free number for this purpose.

Bank of America offers free web site (manual) downloads, "direct" downloads are something under $10/month extra, and require signing up for the service.

BTW, BOA has been deliberately misleading BOA customers who call for technical assistance with BOA's download service. I had to threaten to take my business elsewhere before they would get it working for me (as a former Fleet customer). BOA has been giving out wrong info, and sending former Fleet customers to Microsoft for Microsoft Money download issues (I'm also running Microsoft Money, but not for long), and then Microsoft has been sending them back to BOA.

A Microsoft support person told me that BOA was doing that to push the "premium" download service, since it's literally impossible to get it working properly with the info that BOA tech support had posted at their web site. At least for Money, the "All Other States" choice is ONLY for direct downloads, so if Quicken

When I finally got a 2nd or 3rd level BOA support person on the phone, he explained that they know that the web site is not correct, but that the correct bank choice ("Bank Of America," not "All Other States") attempts to access the BOA web site directly, and they want BOA customers to open a regular MSIE browser window outside of their financial program. When I explained that BOA's instructions is causing our financial programs to update incorrectly (i.e. contact the bank when it should be waiting for a manual download), he said he would submit that request to their tech support group for consideration. Sounds like BOA did nothing.

Look for another choice for BOA in the online service list and see if you can get Quicken to stop trying to contact the bank directly. Then open a separate browser window to download transactions.

I'm using QB 2004 with BoA. I am a former Fleet customer who had to download off of the website. With the final conversion I now download directly using Quicken. I use Bank of America all other states. You DO have call them first and have them enable your download access. IIRC, it took 24 hours for it to become active.

How much are they charging you for the privilege? When I inquired about direct connect, they said it was free for the first 3 months, then $12.95 a minth after that. I told them to kiss my ass.

I use web connect for them; direct connect with every other institution I have business with.

Sorry you were suckered-in by BOA's scam. You obviously missed my point.

We can still download manually, as we did before, but if you follow BOA's instructions, our financial software will NEVER work correctly (i.e. click on "update now" and Quicken will try to download direct, rather than open a new browser window.

I just tried it again on Quicken 2005, and it does open a new browser window in order to download transactions, but when I logged off BOA, the session crashed with a "The page cannot be displayed" error.

When I called for assistance during the Fleet-BOA conversion, I was told $9.99/month, and nothing "free."

Few minutes ago my BOA web session crashed while trying to log off. Looks like they're trashing Quicken sessions (Q05 here) to "encourage" customers to "upgrade."

I just went through that process again with Quicken 2005 and now I see what your problem is, 'cause I just experienced it myself.

Don't use "all other states" for online setup. For web site downloading (with no fee), choose "Bank of America - Fleet Homelink," even if you were never a Fleet customer. That particular choice assumes web site downloads (NOT direct downloads), and when you click on "update now" it will open a web browser window for you to manually log in to BOA's web site. It will also prevent Quicken from trying to download with the on-click update feature.

If you choose "Bank of America - All other states" the setup process will never complete, and it will never work.

According to Bank of America, if you live in NY you should use All Other States. It usually works well, but occasionally will error. I don't know if this would be the same if you lived in a state other than NY.