It’s rare for us to release a beta of our flagship product during a point release. But today we are doing so, and here’s why.
iBank 5.1 adds a lot of great new features that you’ve been asking for. Some of those features (and bug fixes) affect the way that the app connects to banks. While we have lots of test accounts at IGG with some of the biggest financial institutions, we can’t cover them all (and we certainly can’t cover every financial situation at every bank). iBank 5.1 has passed all of our internal tests and we think it is ready to go, but we are asking for your participation: to make iBank 5 the best app out there by helping us find any last minute bugs with bank connectivity (or other parts of the app).
As for specifics, you may still be wondering: what’s new in iBank 5.1? In fact there are over 100 features and fixes. Here are the top 10 main features and improvements:
1. Accounts in the source list are badged with the number of recently downloaded (or imported) transactions.
2. There is now an internal rate of return (IRR) on appropriate investment reports.
3. There is a new Categorized Payee report.
4. You can drag and drop transactions to merge them.
5. Changing the category of a transfer presents the option to break the transfer or delete it.
6. You can show an imported/downloaded transaction’s original import information.
7. Direct Access now supports multi-factor authentication connections.
8. Performance improvements (you now control how often auto-saving occurs — helps with big documents).
9. You can now export report tables.
10. Batch changing transaction types presents an option of what to do when the amount and transaction type conflict.
So, for those that like to beta test software, make a back up of your iBank 5 file and try it out. And most importantly, let us know if you find any issues in the beta: ibank5beta @ iggsoftware.com
-Ian
- Continuing Investments in Direct Access - February 26, 2024
- Banktivity 9: The Little Changes - September 8, 2023
- Retiring services for older versions of Banktivity - August 11, 2023
I sincerely hope you are addressing the lag issue when entering a new transaction and when checking off transactions during a bank or credit card statement reconciliation. I also hope you resolve the differences in budgets synchronized to an iPad. New features are great but performance issues totally eclipse them.
@Mike — you can now change the autosave timer which can drastically improve performance. We aren’t aware of discrepancies between iPad and Mac budget. Please contact support so we can investigate.
“2. There is now an internal rate of return (IRR) on appropriate investment reports.”
Wow ! Exciting ! And please confirm that this correctly accounts for period purchases/sales and correctly respects the date range of the report.
How long do badges stay ?
Accounts in the source list are badged with the number of recently downloaded (or imported) transactions
I think they should disappear the next day
Nice update.
It would be perfect if I can choose a category by typing a part of its name (not only prefix of it) like the iPhone app.
With Capitalone 360 direct download, only the checking and savings account is found, an not the home loan account. Can you add support for it. mint is able to find the home loan account. Thanks!
Glad to see that the lag issues are being at least partially addressed (I’ve been tempted to revert to iBank 4 due to how unresponsive the app can be). What’s the ETA for cloud sync?
Great to see the lag issues fixed, likewise i had been tempted to switch back to 4 as it was a real pain.. now need to sort the syncing to iPhone..
Wow no more Conflicting data in DropBox
seems to be more compatible with DropBox
I used to have “conlicted data” files, whenever I switch computers, and look at my iBank data in Dropbox web site, now I don’t
iBank 5.1 crash upon opening file. Multiple attempts same result. After computer restart same result.
Crash info:
Application Specific Information:
*** Terminating app due to uncaught exception ‘NSInvalidArgumentException’, reason: ‘*** -[_NSConcreteUserNotification setUserInfo:]. UserInfo too big. Encoded data greater than 1k.’
abort() called
terminating with uncaught exception of type NSException
Thanks Bob, we’ve fixed this for the final release.
When I launch the iBank 5.1 beta, I get a dialogue box stating that my trial has ended. It was my understanding that the iBank 5.1 beta includes a 30 day trial. Am I mistaken?
So far so good. Still importing some US Bank checks as withdrawals and not matching existing check in register, resulting in duplicate entries.
One more thing. Still not finding US Bank Line of Credit account. Cf. Sanjiv’s 2/6/14 comment.
Part of the lag problem (initial tabbing to the date field) of entering a new transaction is helped by the autosave option. However, the main lag problem still remains which appears to be due to the auto-complete feature. It makes *every* character typed feel sluggish and I think it’s slow because auto-complete is trying to update every field (amount, category, notes) as I type each letter. I think it’d be faster (and better) if autocomplete would only operate on the field I’m currently typing in. Then when I hit the tab key, you can go ahead and fill in the rest of the fields based on the appropriate template.
Spoke too soon. Still not downloading reliably from US Bank and I agree with Bart Hickman about the lag problem, which is a little better but still very slow.
Hi,
Even though I have bought iBank 5 from the app store, I am not able to use the 5.1 beta as I have 0 days left of my trial.
What gives??!
I see a possibility for buyers of iBank 4 through the app store have the ability to try the 5.1 beta.
Seeing as csv import is important for me, and the 5.1 beta is said to improve on that, I am pretty miffed about not being able to try out the beta – especially seeing as I have bought iBank 5 from the app store – which I can’t put to use because of csv import issues.
Hi,
Made today the latest reconciliation. Even if each transaction was correct in iBank and also open and end balance are according to bank statement and even the ‘Balance’ at each line was correct, there is a difference of -27.00 CHF instead of 0.00.
I’ve been using 5.1 Beta for a week and it really does improve performance. After the 30 day trial do we get a chance to purchase the update or will my software revert back to 5.0. I hope not because I Bank5 was so slow I stopped using it.
Beta 5.1 has certainly restored some of the product’s reputation following 5.0 I think there needs to be more options to manage the new features intrioduced in 5.0 downloads. I will switch to 5.1 when it is released,been holding onto 4.7.4 so as to keep my sanity.
Don’t know what other users think but DA is good in concept but too unreliable in application, I wish IGG had invested more of its development time enhancing the register, reporting and most importantnly a solid cloud synch solution for all its platforms.
I held high hopes this would solve all my issues with DA and Multifactor Auth tokens. So close, yet so far unfortunately, after installing the beta, repeatedly putting in the same credentials and settings I managed to get to the page where it find and allows me to select the accounts to import only the once 🙁
When I did manage to get it to import it worked fine, but then subsequent refreshes of the account just timed out or didn’t respond. I really really hope this only affects the beta and the kinks are worked out. Ive waited nearly a year for this feature to work how I wanted to I can actually start to use iBank for what I bought it for. I really really do not want to have to manually export and import my data.
Happy for support to give me a shout if they want to see this in action.
If there is an updated beta prior to launch, how will we be notified?
Paul has a good question
Maybe showing which beta ia for download would help
Ian, you mentioned this has been fixed in the final release?
_NSConcreteUserNotification setUserInfo:]. UserInfo too big. Encoded data greater than 1k.
Is there any way around it for now?
What is the ETA for 5.1? I’ve been running the beta for weeks now…
I would like to see TAGS for transactions – that helps a lot in grouping and organizing finances (e.g. all transactions (transport, hotel, dining etc.) for a business trip can share the same tag so you can find all the expenses associated with that trip with a simple search or create a report for reimbursement etc. – using the category fields for that wont work because the category fields are needed for proper accounting and tax reporting)
I also would like to be able to have several NOTE FIELDS per transaction – all the transactions coming from my bank accounts have several note fields (especially if they charge for something in a different currency) and I need to be able to IMPORT those into iBank for reference.
Hi Ian,
When will be the ETA for version 5.1. Version 5.04 still have lots of bugs and basically useless for me. It has so many problems downloading transaction from my Canadian Banks.
Best Regards,
Daniel
Can we get an update on 5.1? Everyone is just asking for a little communication. Since posting the beta, there has been no communication. It only takes a moment of your time to provide a quick update for your valued users. Well, users…. Valued would mean communication happens at least weekly to keep everyone updated.
Hope to release it this week.
Thanks, Ian! That’s great news!
I just downloaded IBank 5.1 and now I can’t download from my bank, Northern Michigan Bank and Trust. I was able to do so with IBank 5. So what has happened? Please let me know.
Should I go back and redownload IBank 5 and forget about the update?
Thanks for the update! One issue I’m having is duplicate entries in my payee report. For example “Starbucks” has two entries. The are spelled the same, in caps and categorized correctly. What am I doing wrong?
c
I own I BANK 5.0 how can I upgrade to 5.1 ?
do I have to pay again.
you said on your advertising dated March 4th that ” e free uptate for curent user of version 5 is available immediately for IGG online store .. how to proceed
Thanks
I second the comment above about needing tags for transactions.
Just want to know, when will be the next update for iPad ?
Thanks
I am hoping for comparison reports to be available soon. Is this feature upcoming??
Please include an option to automatically enter scheduled transactions in any future update. It is a real pain to have to manually select each scheduled transaction and click the ‘post’ button when they become due. This is a feature I really appreciated in my old version of Quicken and would love to see in iBank.
“Accounts in the source list are badged with the number of recently downloaded (or imported) transactions.”
How can I get rid of these badges, as I really don’t want them ?
Just downoaded and took a look at the current iBank (5.2.1). Although many things about it seem nice, it is unusable for my older eyes with the tiny fonts. I recall that problem from last time I checked out iBank in 2012 and it doesn’t appear to have changed. I use my personal finance software too much to strain my eyes trying to read the tiny print. I do know how to magnify the whole screen, but always running the app like that would be too painful. Sorry, but it’s a deal-breaker for me – not just a nice-to-have.
I’m currently running iBank 5.5.1 and although the functionality and features are great, performance is becoming a real issue. When you type in payee names the characters appear slower than an old fashioned telex machine (yes I have tried deleting all the transaction templates) and reconciling a bank or credit card statement is a nightmare – the processing is so slow you can’t remember which entry you ‘ticked off’ as the beach ball appears so often. Can anyone explain why the software performance has degraded to a level where iBank is almost unusable?
Thanks
Running 5.5.1 on a pretty fast iMac and our file of 3+ years is 80 Megs. Everything has become slow and boggy. What do we do to speed up performance? (Changed auto save to 1 minute from 0 seconds.) On Quicken years ago we used to archive prior years. Any guidance is much appreciated!
This is more of a general comment. I used quicken for years after MS money left the market. Its was ok for a little while but it started to make a lot of mistakes when syncing with my bank accounts. I don’t know what the rules are when you write programs for Apple App store but I know your app has to be approved. Apple may also require the same thing for apps that it applies to all its products. That is that every user experience is the same. This is probably the reason why you can’t customize your desktop or use themes. That being said, Ibank is wonderful program. It works extremely well despite being a relatively boring program on the interface front. Ibank is definitely the best for Mac and apple and that is why people use it. Adding some color to the interface and tweaking a few features would catapult Ibank to top of its industry. And if they could make a version that worked just as well for windows products Quicken might just start sweating in their high rise office.
Also making the categorization feature on the desktop version similar to the way its done on the iPad version would rock. I will grab my iPad when sitting at my desk to categorize because it is so much easier.