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PaintedStuff
PaintedStuff
Known Participant
October 14, 2018
Answered

Downloaded PDF from TD Bank not editable.

  • October 14, 2018
  • 7 replies
  • 94245 views

TD Bank's statements are downloaded as Secure PDFs.  In order to edit (I like to highlight them as I reconcile my balance each month) I need to enter a Permissions Password.  I called the bank and they said it's something I need to do within my software.   I'm using Acrobat Pro DC 

Help please!!!

Thanks.

    Correct answer doctorsney

    thank you, this save as method circumvented the encryption, another hoop to jump through but whatever.

    I'm also using this to do my book keeping for taxes, and want to annotate my digital bank statements instead of printing out reams of paper to markup physically.

     

    Thanks to y'all for hashing out a soluttion that could be easily googled.


    oh for anyone wondering my workaround/workflow on OSX Catalina was open the statement pdf in Preview and then:

     

    File > Export as PDF... and the resulting file will be editable/saveable 

    (because at some point I have spent hours marking up a pdf only to realise my marks would not be saved, and there was much gnashing of teeth and renting of garments and wailing)

    7 replies

    W
    Wilton28483385ljwi
    Participant
    February 19, 2023

    Solution: 

    1 - Open the PDF in Google Chrome

    2 - CTRL + P (Windows) or Command + P (Mac)

    3 - Print as PDF 

    Save your file, DONE (: 

    arshdeeps76065440
    arshdeeps76065440
    Participant
    February 1, 2022

    I have figured it out!  Open you bank statement in google chrome.  Click file-print-save as pdf.  And now you can edit in adobe pro!  

      C
      Control27338920ncec
      Participant
      November 28, 2022

      Hey man, just for you know. I ran in the same kind problem.

      I founded out if you send the pdfs to your email (gmail) and click on PRINT straight from the email thread (don't download the files) then, from print save as PDF, re-name it. After that you should be able to open in photoshop/illustrator/indesign etc... 😃 you are welcome.

      U
      usability medic
      Participant
      December 8, 2021

      Thanks to all who provided workarounds.  I used the workaround provided by doctorsney and it worked.

       

      TD claims the reason they lock this down is becuase of federal regulations, because we're not supposed to be able to edit the data on our statements.  While that is completely understandable, I tried to explain to them that commenting (for the purpose of highlighting or adding a comment about payment date and related details) does NOT edit the data and simply adds information "on top" of the document but TD thinks that's still editing.

       

      So the workaround is a Godsend.  Thanks so much.

        K
        kthxbyte
        Participant
        July 13, 2020

        Please don't think I agree with this rationale, but the logic behind bank statements being uneditable is because they are used for many purposes: they help adjudicate billing issues between customers and private businesses, are used to prove you're don't have recent NSF fees, or even required for low-income citizens to apply for a payday loan (terrible idea, yes, but when you don't have another option I can understand that decision-making process). Since they can be so versatile, making them editable increases the chances of fraud and identity theft.

        So I absolutely understand why none of the content of a bank statement should be editable. When it comes to highlighting a signed document, I'm not sure how that could possibly be a problem, but redacting a signed document is a bit more complicated of an issue that needs to be looked at by real experts.

        However, I'm looking at my last statement and it is NOT a signed document... Therefore, I should be allowed to redact whatever information I fancy, even though I understand that I still can't edit the document.

         

        Adobe needs to think this through. This is not a debate that armchair lawyers should be having on a tech-related forum... It's something they should have thought of when they came up with the feature.

        try67
        Community Expert
        try67Community Expert
        Community Expert
        July 13, 2020

        It's quite easy to get around a PDF security policy (although I won't explain how), but not so with a digital signature.

        A file that is just secured and not digitally signed can not be trusted to not have been modified, basically.

        Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com
        Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com
        Legend
        July 13, 2020

        Many banks are now doing this, but the security settings are incorrectly set to prevent commenting (such as highlighting entries on the statement). Most banks are using 3rd party PDF-generating software to create our bank statements, and it's questionable how well those geeks understand PDFs.

         

        Acrobat and the PDF standard does allow for security on the PDF as well as commenting/highlighting. The programmers need to learn about this setting.

         

        One of my banks goes even further by setting the PDF to hide all menus, so the average user can't even save their monthly bank statement to their computer.

         

        Complain to your bank about these insane settings they're building into your PDFs.

         

        |    Bevi Chagnon   |  Designer, Trainer, & Technologist for Accessible Documents ||    PubCom |    Classes & Books for Accessible InDesign, PDFs & MS Office |
        F
        fxm
        Participant
        April 26, 2020

        this is a real pain.  the best workaround i could find was to export the online pdf as a word doc and then save the word doc as a pdf

        D
        darlaha
        Participant
        April 16, 2020

        Has anyone found a workaround for this issue? The print to Microsoft pdf used to work, but I found that is not the case any longer either. Oddly enough I can't even print to paper and rescan. Creepy but it still thinks it is a password-protected document.  I have always kept the 12 months together as one year and now Adobe will not allow me to combine the monthly statements.  This is most frustrating.  HELP!

          T
          Test Screen Name
          Legend
          April 16, 2020

          These files ARE protected and Adobe software WILL respect that. Complaints should be made to the bank. They will tell you it is to protect against fraud. Not sure how it does, but we are stuck with it. 

           

          To combine files use the “portfolio” option. 

            D
            darlaha
            Participant
            April 16, 2020

            Thank you this is an acceptable workaround. I only wish someone had suggested it before


            try67
            Community Expert
            try67Community Expert
            Community Expert
            October 14, 2018

            They need to give you the password so you could do it. We can't help you

            get around it without the password.

              PaintedStuff
              PaintedStuffAuthor
              Known Participant
              October 14, 2018

              There is no password.  I used to be able to edit them and in 2017 they changed something with their online banking system and I haven't been able to since.  I've spoken to a few people in their IT department.  They do not issue passwords.  They said it's something with MY Adobe software.

              "Creative minds have always been known to survive any kind of bad training."-Anna Freud
              try67
              Community Expert
              try67Community Expert
              Community Expert
              October 14, 2018

              They are wrong.

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