Yikes! Data has gone AWOL

[JJStephens]

I started a return back in August--entered all the data I had. However, client mentioned farm rental income so everything got put on hold. Just started to work on the return again. It's empty. Nothing there.

Anyone else ever experience this? Better yet, anyone have any idea what happened and if it's a loss? I don't think it's a failure to save issue. I'm set to auto-save every five minutes and I'm stickler for frequent saves.

I've used ATX most of the last 20+ years and have never seen/heard anything like it.

[Jack from Ohio]

Close all programs.

Reboot

Use the restore function.  Restore to the latest version that is stored.  If that is blank, go to the next oldest one.

Edited September 28, 2015 by Jack from Ohio

[JJStephens]

Thanks for the tip Jack. Alas, it didn't work. There was only one version listed and it was also blank. I ended up just rekeying in all the data.

[Jack from Ohio]

For the record, AutoSave has not worked since 2011.  If you start a new return, not rolled over, and do not save before or when you close, it will be blank when you go back.

ATX better have this fixed for 2015, or I will send an e-mail twice a day, and make a phone call a day till they do.

[mcb39]

This is one of the reasons that I have a jump drive on board whenever I am working on a tax return.  I export the return to the jump drive any time I make any major changes and, of course, when it is finished.  This also allows you to import any return into the program on another computer for whatever reason.

[Abby Normal]

This is one of the reasons that I have a jump drive on board whenever I am working on a tax return.  I export the return to the jump drive any time I make any major changes and, of course, when it is finished.  This also allows you to import any return into the program on another computer for whatever reason.

Closing a return creates a backup in:

C:\ProgramData\CCH Small Firm Services\ATX 2014 Server\ATX 2014 Backup

I Ctrl+s almost every time before I jump to another form. I have autosave turned off, in case I screw something up or if I'm just doing "what ifs" in the data file.

[JJStephens]

Aarrghhh! It just happened again. I was working on a return for about 30 minutes. Had to step away for a few minutes. When I came back I had a message saying ATX was not able to connect to the server (I've gotten that a lot over the last couple years) and asked if I wanted to retry or cancel. I clicked retry and the program closed. Lost the whole thing.

I'm normally pretty serious about frequent saves but I was so intense on this one that I don't recall having clicked the save icon. My bad.

So auto-save hasn't worked since 2011. I didn't know that.

Well, I guess I'm only at risk for another 10-15 extensions. I've already purchased Drake for next year. I used to love ATX. That seems like a long time ago.

[Abby Normal]

I've found that closing messages with the 'x' is always the best option.

[JJStephens]

Quick update on this.

The problem continued to happen and even got worse. I wrapped up a return last night, saved it and closed ATX. When I opened ATX this morning the return was blank.

I called ATX support. It is apparently a known issue following 14.7 updates. She renamed a hidden file deep in my Windows folder forcing ATX to recreate that file. She said that would take care of it. I asked what specifically was wrong. All she would say is, "It's just a file that got corrupted. We made it create a new file so that should take care of it." I tried to press but that's all I got out of her. So far, I'm half way through re-entering the data and it appears to be working ok.

By the way, when I first called she asked if I had upgraded to Win10. When I said no she replied with an enthusiastic, "Good!" Makes me wonder if Win10 isn't playing nicely with ATX software.

 

[Catherine]

There sure is *something* not playing nicely with your ATX software.  It might be the software playing not-nicely with itself (with apologies for the rude allusion).