A Note on Statement Passwords

What this note is about

Some statements arrive password-protected, and the password handling is easy to get wrong if the file is being passed around by email.

Password-protected does not mean safely handled

A password-protected statement can still end up being handled badly. The common mistake is sending the PDF and the password through the same email thread, then forwarding both around again when someone else needs the spreadsheet.

The converter can accept a password when it needs one, but that does not remove the need to think about how the file reached you in the first place.

Support should not start with the full statement

If a conversion fails, the first useful details are usually boring: bank name, country, page count, whether it is scanned, and the error shown.

I do not want the default support habit to be 'send me the bank statement'. That is too much data for most problems.