Internet Banking - can't search transactions older than 2 years?

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Forums › Finance and wealth management › Internet Banking - can't search transactions older than 2 years?

GeoffisPure

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#315359 7-Jul-2024 15:35

Hi All,

I'm with ANZ. When I do a transaction search through their Internet Banking website, I can quickly and easily see all the transactions that match my search keyword over the past 2 years. But it's not possible to see anything older than 2 years.

When I messaged the bank to see if they could do the search for me, they said my only option is to download my PDF monthly statements and browse/search for these transactions in each one. That would be 56 PDF documents over 7 years. For context, I'm trying to find out the total amount I've sent someone over this period.

For those that are with other banks, can you tell me if your bank has the same limitation, or are you able to search your complete transaction history? If it's common across all banks, does anyone know why? It seems like such an arbitrary and unnecessary website limitation, but it's annoying enough to me that I'd consider switching bank for better Internet Banking.

Cheers,

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#3257122 7-Jul-2024 16:17

If they did have a larger timeframe they would need a larger database with more space, and it would cost more, and guess who has to pay for it?

Your question and need to search back that far is probably very rare, for 99% of people there would be no need to do this.

Linux

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#3257124 7-Jul-2024 16:27

bnz is the same the more data they hold on into production systems (not backups) has real world costs to it and could impact / slow down things

it is 100% necessary

alasta

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#3257128 7-Jul-2024 16:40

Yes, same for BNZ. I use my personal finance software for this type of thing - I have ten years of history in there.

geek3001

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#3257129 7-Jul-2024 16:45

I have just checked my ASB account using their Internet Banking, and I can search back seven years, exactly, ie: as far back as 07 July 2017, with today being 07 July 2024.

Seven years of searchable transaction history makes sense, given that individuals and companies are supposedly required to retain transaction and banking records etc for seven years.

Perhaps some banks are more 'helpful' with access to transaction history than others.

antant

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#3257130 7-Jul-2024 16:52

Westpac I can go as far back as one of my accounts opened by exporting as CSV ... that is, October 2009

Behodar

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#3257131 7-Jul-2024 16:52

Westpac shows seven years in the filter dropdown, but only the most recent three years appear in the results (one for the brain dead software thread?). If I export to CSV then it goes back to the start of the account (1998, in my case).

ech3lon

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#3257135 7-Jul-2024 17:17

BNZ here, my credit card account goes as far back as 1st Aug 2012, more than 10 years.

I think some of you overestimated the amount of transaction that are just text data with some overhead, a one minute of YouTube HD video is probably larger than 30 years worth of transaction data.

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kiwiharry

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#3257137 7-Jul-2024 17:20

@GeoffisPure I just tested this by downloading the pdf for transactions in 2019. When you export the pdf statements make sure you select all 12 months of the year and it will produce a pdf with the full year of transactions, so you'd only need to download and look/search through 6 pdf documents for transactions between 2018-2023.

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GeoffisPure

459 posts

Ultimate Geek

#3257214 7-Jul-2024 21:21

kiwiharry:

@GeoffisPure I just tested this by downloading the pdf for transactions in 2019. When you export the pdf statements make sure you select all 12 months of the year and it will produce a pdf with the full year of transactions, so you'd only need to download and look/search through 6 pdf documents for transactions between 2018-2023.

Thanks for this - a bit quicker than I thought it would be. But because it's PDF I'm still going to have to copy the relevant bits line by line into a spreadsheet.

In 2024 I feel that these two things are unacceptable:
That you can only search 2 years of history online
That you can only download the last 7 years of history as PDF.

Maybe when this open banking things happens I'll be able to access more of my own information? 🙃

ANglEAUT

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#3257222 7-Jul-2024 22:44

GeoffisPure: Thanks for this - a bit quicker than I thought it would be. But because it's PDF I'm still going to have to copy the relevant bits line by line into a spreadsheet.

Note that the latest versions of Excel can open PDF documents directly.

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michaelmurfy

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#3257223 8-Jul-2024 01:21

GeoffisPure:

In 2024 I feel that these two things are unacceptable:
That you can only search 2 years of history online
That you can only download the last 7 years of history as PDF.

Believe me when I say (as somebody who literally built and maintained a large amount of internet banking infrastructure for ANZ still in use today) these limits are there for a reason. There is nothing worse than somebody with a whole lot of transactions requesting 7 years of banking history in one go putting the slowdown on an application server or their request timing out, them hitting the button over and over and actually killing an application server (true story). Admittedly this happened years ago and since then a whole lot of caching and protection has been put in place to prevent this.

Maybe when this open banking things happens I'll be able to access more of my own information? 🙃

Doubt it. But if you need more features for business use then you can go nuts with https://anzdirect.co.nz instead and that'll allow you to grab whatever you want.

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Delorean

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#3257252 8-Jul-2024 09:20

I used to work with NBNZ and then ANZ post-merger. The bank must keep only 7 years of transactional data, and "back in the day," this involved staff members downloading customer statements from the cold archive - customers couldn't see it.

I can see the merit with some people here saying it should be available online for 7 years; however, if you are processing thousands of transactions per month, then this is a heap of records to keep active. 2 years searchable makes sense.

As others have said, if you wanted to search transactions 5 years ago, why? For most personal customers, this is pointless, as your financial outgoings and income would have changed, especially with costs increasing. The most relevant data is within the last 24 months; as a side, positive credit reporting is also set as a 24-month history.

I also bank with ASB, and the 7 years of history is a 'nice to have'. However, I have never used it.

IIRC, The Core banking system ANZ used back then only retained 12 months of active history; I know this was expanded when they upgraded the system in 2011.

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eracode

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#3257262 8-Jul-2024 09:39

Delorean:

As others have said, if you wanted to search transactions 5 years ago, why? For most personal customers, this is pointless, as your financial outgoings and income would have changed, especially with costs increasing. The most relevant data is within the last 24 months; as a side, positive credit reporting is also set as a 24-month history.

The OP has explained why he wants to search back seven years - and it’s a valid reason. It’s not your call to tell him that it’s unnecessary or pointless. Changes to “financial outgoings and income” and credit reporting timings are irrelevant to what he is trying to do.

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Delorean

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#3257276 8-Jul-2024 10:09

eracode:

Delorean:

As others have said, if you wanted to search transactions 5 years ago, why? For most personal customers, this is pointless, as your financial outgoings and income would have changed, especially with costs increasing. The most relevant data is within the last 24 months; as a side, positive credit reporting is also set as a 24-month history.

The OP has explained why he wants to search back seven years - and it’s a valid reason. It’s not your call to tell him that it’s unnecessary or pointless. Changes to “financial outgoings and income” and credit reporting timings are irrelevant to what he is trying to do.

Yes, he did point out why; however, is the OP willing to pay additional fees to maintain the infrastructure so that they can find out how much is paid to one person?

The banks work on the principle that the needs of the many outweigh those of the few.

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Kookoo

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#3257279 8-Jul-2024 10:18

I'm with Kiwibank - can't go further back than 2 years.

I needed to see my historical transactions at some point, so I called them. They emailed me a bunch of scans (!) of printed PDFs (!) of historical transaction statements, and charged me a few cents for the privilege. :D

Hello, Ground!

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