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A new phone and sync: what carries over

Sync (Premium) keeps up to 4 devices working on the same records: signing in with the same Google or Apple account, in Settings › Cloud Sync, brings the accounts, movements and documents recorded on one phone to the others. It is designed to share the records, not to clone the phone — on a new device most things appear, but some of the work exists only on the phone where it was done. Knowing which is which, before switching, avoids surprises after.

What arrives on the new phone

After signing in with the same account and letting the first sync finish, the new phone shows:

• Accounts and all their movements — income, expenses and transfers;
• Categories and subcategories, with their icons and colours;
• Entities (customers, suppliers, "Other");
• Invoices and documents recorded against those entities;
• Budgets and projects;
• Recurring transactions and planned cash-flow events;
• Custom exchange rates;
• The reconciliation state of each movement — whether it is reconciled, the date, and the bank identifier (FITID) — which lives on the movement itself: a reconciled movement stays reconciled on the new phone, and matching already done does not have to be repeated;
• Current-account reconciliations per entity, including how each one is composed.

What stays on the old phone

• Receipt photos and PDFs — from version 1.5.0 they travel. Files attached to movements are kept in the cloud (a data centre in Europe) and downloaded on whichever of your devices opens them; a document created in the current account from a movement carries that movement's first attachment. Up to version 1.4.0 the files existed only on the phone where they were added — on that version, see the next section for the way to take them with you.
• The rules learned from bank statements (the automatic categorisation), together with the per-supplier reading templates used by receipt scanning. The movements an import created do travel, like any other movement, and reconciled movements stay reconciled — but the rules learned from the statements stay on the device that learned them.
• The PIN and its recovery code: each phone has its own lock, set in its own Settings.
• Most settings. Only a small set travels with the data: the currency, the currency symbol position, the date and number formats, what the dashboard shows (a chart or Dues), the chart period, the Entity and Note field options (including whether Entity is required), the Projects option, whether notifications are on and their days, the exchange rates, and My business — its name, tax number and entity, though not the logo. Everything else in Settings has to be set again on the new phone.

Switching phones: a safe order

1. A backup first, on the old phone. Settings › Backup & Restore › Create Backup, on every plan: one .zip file with the whole book and the receipt files that are on that phone, saved where you choose. It is the copy that does not depend on any phone. The export (Premium) also writes the movements to Excel / CSV / OFX files, for reading elsewhere.
2. The receipt files. From version 1.5.0 they arrive with the movements once the new phone has synced with a connection — nothing to do. On version 1.4.0 they exist only on the old phone: the one export that includes them is the accountant package (Premium), a ZIP with one PDF per transaction; generate it on the old phone and keep that phone until the files are confirmed safe. The package now asks which form each document takes — with the movement's details (a strip with date, account, category and amount over the document) or the document only, exactly as scanned; the choice is remembered.
3. On the new phone, install ZeniCash, sign in with the same account before recording anything, and let the first sync finish completely before judging what is missing. With 4 devices already syncing, the new phone is refused until one is removed in Synced devices — see The devices of an account below. Without sync, Restore Backup brings the book from the file instead — it replaces everything on the phone.
4. Review Settings on the new phone: as listed above, most preferences are per-device.
5. Keep the old phone until everything checks out. Only wipe it, or pass it on, after confirming the new phone shows the accounts, movements and documents expected.

Signing in with a book already on the phone

From version 1.7.4, a book created on this phone and never synced stays when the phone signs in to an account for the first time: nothing is emptied, and the first sync merges it with what the account already holds in the cloud. Up to version 1.7.3 that first sign-in set the book aside and showed an empty one.

Where an earlier version set a book aside like that, the app asks once, after signing in: Data from this phone, from before you signed in, was set aside. Bring it into this account? Bring it back merges it into the account's book, replacing nothing, and the next sync sends it to the cloud. Not now leaves it set aside on the phone; the question comes back after the next sign-in. It is not asked while the phone is in a shared space.

When a different account signs in on a phone that held another account's book, that book is set aside and the phone moves to the incoming account's own records. From version 1.7.4 an incoming account that has nothing on the phone starts with the default categories, the Wallet and the default entity types, as on a fresh install; until then it started with none, and no expense could be saved.

The devices of an account

Settings › Cloud Sync › Synced devices lists the phones and tablets syncing with the account, with this device on the one in hand and when each was last active; from version 1.7.4 each one is named by its model — «Samsung SM-…», for example — with a short code that tells two of the same model apart. Premium syncs up to 4 devices. Removing a device from the list signs it out: at once if it is this one, at its next sync if it is another — what is on that phone stays on it.

When the account is already at its limit, the phone that is one too many is refused, and from version 1.7.4 it says so wherever sync shows: the box Device limit reached, with Manage devices, appears after a sync started in Settings and, once, on its own when an automatic sync is refused; the dashboard keeps a notice with Manage devices for as long as the limit holds; and the sync line in Settings reads Device limit reached. Up to version 1.7.3 only a sync started in Settings said so. Manage devices opens Synced devices; on the way back, the app tries to sync again.

Until a device is removed, that phone does not sync, and the account's records do not show on it: what it shows is not the account's book. A phone that was reinstalled, or had the app's data cleared, counts as a new device — its old entry is still in Synced devices, and that is the one to remove.

Without Premium nothing syncs. Someone whose Premium has ended can send that phone's pending changes once, with Final upload to the cloud.

When sync says "No internet connection"

A network that claims to be connected but does not answer — a hotel Wi-Fi, a broken DNS — used to leave the sync spinner going with no end. From version 1.5.0 each call to the cloud waits one minute and then gives up: the app says "No internet connection.", keeps everything already received, and the next sync picks up where it left off.

A fresh install follows the phone's region

From version 1.5.0 a new installation opens in the currency, date order and number format of the phone's region, with the theme set to follow the phone. An existing installation changes nothing: it keeps the currency, formats and theme it had.

Sync is not a backup

Sync's job is to keep the devices in use consistent with one another — not to preserve a copy of everything for later: what is deleted on one phone is deleted on the others. The copy that survives any phone is the backup file, free, in Settings › Backup & Restore. Making one regularly — for example at the end of each month — costs little, and means a change of phone never depends on what sync carries.

Restoring it replaces the book on the phone. From version 1.7.4, a backup made under another ZeniCash account is refused with nothing changed, and on a phone signed in to sync, sync stays paused after the restore so the book stays as the backup left it — until it is resumed, with a confirmation, and the records in the cloud are merged back in. See PIN lock, backups and deleting your account.