HELP with Canadian banks-what is the status on the new providers!

I just got started from Canada and I am only having issues with one bank. RBC is working well, but not Manulife. What kind of issues are you having ?

When I try to refresh EQ Bank on https://my.tillerhq.com/, it will authenticate and show all the account balances, but after clicking on the “update” button, it spins for ~ 5 mins and then it returns to the same status (red triangle to the left of the institution name) and the last refresh date remains unchanged, and no new transactions appear in my spreadsheet.

I have used the manual update for these accounts, which works but it is very inconvenient. I’m trying to advocate to my bank to adopt Open standards, looking for alternative products to use (but most seem to have update issues), or find better workarounds within Tiller. I just haven’t had time to do much on this lately.

Good luck @swimkim2

Thanks for responding with such a thorough answer. What you just described is exactly what is happening to me with Manulife Bank. It will definitely be a challenge to be updating manually all the time, especially when you also have to convert pdf to csv, then upload. I am very disappointed that our Canadian Banks are so challenging. I will try to find solutions if I can in the meantime. Yes, our banks in Canada need to adopt Open Standards and I will try my best to get the message through to my banks. Thanks again for your reply.

Hi @jemmoa7 I just found Tiller, it looked perfect, I am also in Canada. Is there an alternative to Tiller that works here? I need a good spreadsheet thing a ma jigger like this just sounded so cool I’m a bit disappointed I can’t use it.

Have you found an alternative to Tiller? It looked…perfect, I was in love at the sounds of it, but alas…what is an alternative that is similar in Canada?

Hi!
I don’t know of any “Tiller-like” service that is based in Canada. But, I have settled on Quicken Simplifi for my budget app. You can use Simplifi for Envelope Budgeting, Zero Based Budgeting, and simply an expense tracker. It has better reports than most other on-line apps. The best part, is it syncs my Canadian banks reliably with no issues so far. (I’ve been using it for two months). AND - it handles syncing of pending transactions (something I’ve wanted for years) as well. It’s handling of long term goals is superb. Support is also the best I’ve ever seen. They have an active user community (like Tiller) and are improving the product regularly. You can talk to support in person. Just give them your callback number and they will help you out. The price is right, too. It cost me around $50 CAD for a year. (they have 40% off their rates ) I still love Tiller, because you can really drill down into your expenses (if that’s your thing!) But it is SO easy to break things in Tiller, since it is designed for spreadsheets. So you have to have good knowledge of either Sheets or Excel. Tiller has taught me everything I know about Sheets! I have set up Simplifi similar to YNAB, (without all the “rules”. ) I’ll get back to Tiller when they figure out how to sync banks a bit better, and support Canadian Banks. Good Luck!