Troubleshooting

Find your symptom. Each one ends with what to do, including when the answer is to ask somebody.

I cannot sign in

Work down this list in order.

1. Are you using your full username? It probably contains an @ and everything after it matters. alice@company, not alice.
2. Are you connecting to the right address? A branded web address such as files.company.com works in a browser only. SFTP and FTPS use the address your administrator gave you for them.
3. Are you using the right protocol and port? SFTP is port 22. FTPS is 990. FTPES is 21.
4. Caps lock. Yes, really.
5. Did you set up a second factor and lose it? Use a recovery code. See Set up your second factor.
6. Did you forget your password? If the web client's sign in page shows Forgot your password?, use it. If it does not, ask your administrator for a new one. See Change or reset your password.

If all of that is right, ask your administrator. The service deliberately never tells you which part was wrong, so there is nothing more you can learn from the message. They can see the real reason.

I connect, and there are no folders

You have signed in successfully and nothing has been granted to you yet, or what was granted is temporarily unreachable.

There is nothing you can fix from your side. Ask your administrator to check your access.

A folder will not open

Either you have not been granted access to it, or the storage behind it is not connected right now.

The two read differently. A missing permission is refused as a permission. An offline storage says so: the web client shows that the storage is offline, and SFTP or FTPS clients report "storage endpoint unavailable". An offline folder comes back by itself when its storage reconnects, in the session you already have; nothing you do from your side speeds that up. For a permission, ask your administrator.

I can upload but not download, or the other way around

That is deliberate. Access is granted per folder and can be one directional:

• Upload only: you can add files and not read them back.
• Drop box: you can add files without seeing what is there, including your own earlier uploads.
• View and download: you can read and not change anything.

If you need something different, ask your administrator.

An action failed and I do not know why

The service never tells you why an operation was refused. That is on purpose: a precise message is also a map of what exists and what is permitted.

Your administrator can see the exact reason in their log, immediately.

My SFTP client suddenly warns about the host key

Stop. Do not accept it until you have asked.

There is a legitimate reason: your organization moved to a new server, and the key changed with it. There is an illegitimate one, and it looks exactly the same.

Ask your administrator for the current fingerprint and compare it before accepting.

My key stopped working

1. Are you pointing at the private key, not the .pub one?
2. On macOS or Linux, are the permissions too open? chmod 600 on the private key file.
3. Did somebody register a new set of keys on your account? That can replace all of them at once.

See Use an SSH key.

Transfers are slow

Some of this you can influence and some you cannot.

• Your own connection is the usual answer. Test it.
• A speed cap may be set on your account or on the whole service. Your administrator knows.
• Many small files are always slower than one large file of the same total size. Zip them.
• The storage behind the service may be far from the service. Nothing you can do; mention it.

A move or rename fails

Some of the folders you see come from different storage behind the scenes, and a move between two of them is refused.

Download and re-upload, or copy and then delete. Your administrator can tell you which of your folders are in the same storage.

My upload is rejected as too large

The browser caps the size of one uploaded file. The standard cap is 4 GiB, and your administrator may have set a different one.

Use an SFTP client instead. There is no such cap there.

My share link does not work

The recipient sees	Meaning
Share unavailable	It expired, was deleted, or reached its access limit
A password prompt	You set a password. Send it to them, separately from the link
Nothing loads at all	They may be outside the addresses you allowed on the share

Check the share on your Shares page. See Sharing files.

I am locked out of my account

Too many failed attempts locks a sign in temporarily. Wait a few minutes and try again.

If you have lost your second factor and your recovery codes, your administrator can reset it for you.

Who to ask

The person or team who gave you your access. They have a support relationship with the service and can see exactly what happened.

Syncplify support cannot help you directly: your account belongs to your organization, not to us, and we have no way to see it without your organization's explicit consent.