QuickBooks Banking Error 355
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How to fix QuickBooks Banking Error=355
QuickBooks Online Banking Error · Corrupted / Unreadable Data
How to Fix QuickBooks Banking Error 355
QuickBooks displays: "Banking Error 355: We're having trouble getting information from your bank." — the bank responded but the data returned was corrupted or in a format QB couldn't parse.
At QuickFix Bookkeeping, Error 355 is the data-quality counterpart to Error 319 (no response received): 319 = timeout, 355 = bad data received. The bank's feed returned a response, but the data was malformed, truncated, or contained characters that broke QB's parser. This is often triggered by a specific transaction with unusual characters (special characters in a payee name, unusually long transaction descriptions, or non-ASCII characters) that the bank's feed exports incorrectly.
The QuickFix Bookkeeping Distinction — 355 and the "Bad Transaction" Diagnostic
Error 355 often traces to a single problematic transaction in the date range being downloaded. If 355 appears when downloading a specific date range: try downloading a smaller range (e.g., last 7 days instead of last 30 days). If that succeeds: expand the range one week at a time until 355 reappears — the week that triggers it contains the problematic transaction. Then: download that week from the bank's website as a .QBO file → open in a text editor → look for transactions with unusual characters, very long descriptions, or non-standard payee names → import manually after removing the problematic character. This targeted approach resolves most persistent 355 errors that don't self-resolve.
What Causes QuickBooks Banking Error 355?
Transaction with Special / Non-ASCII Characters
Primary 355 cause — a transaction in the download range has a payee name or description containing special characters (em dash, trademark symbol, currency symbols, accented letters, or non-Latin characters) that the bank's feed exports improperly. QB's parser fails on the malformed data and reports 355. Downloading a smaller date range pinpoints the transaction.
Bank Changed Feed Data Format
The bank updated the format of its transaction feed (OFX version, field ordering, encoding) and QB's parser doesn't recognise the new format. This affects all downloads from that bank until Intuit updates the bank's profile. Disconnecting and reconnecting forces QB to download the latest profile.
Truncated Response from Bank Server
The bank's server sent a partial response (truncated due to a server error or network interruption). QB received some data but it's incomplete, making it unparseable. This often resolves on retry — the next download completes fully.
Very Large Transaction Volume in Date Range
Downloading a very large date range (90+ days on a high-volume account) returns a response so large it exceeds QB's parser buffer. Reducing the date range to 30 days or less resolves this variant of 355.
Bank Temporarily Returning Error Page as Data
The bank's data feed endpoint returned an HTML error page (403, 500) instead of transaction data. QB received a response but it's HTML, not OFX/QBO — QB reports 355 because the "data" can't be parsed as transactions. This resolves when the bank's server issue clears.
Corrupted QB Banking Data Cache
QB's local banking cache file is corrupted and interferes with parsing the incoming data. Running QB Tool Hub's Quick Fix My Program and reconnecting the bank feed clears the corrupted cache.
How to Fix QuickBooks Banking Error 355
Related QuickBooks Banking Errors
Error 355 on a Specific Date Range Despite Reconnecting?
Let QuickFix Bookkeeping Find the Problem Transaction.
When 355 is range-specific, we parse the .QBO file directly to identify the exact transaction with malformed data and import the clean transactions while flagging the one that needs manual entry.
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