faq balances reset

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🧨 FAQ: Balances Appear Reset to 0

When a /balance suddenly returns 0 $, it's usually one of these 5 causes (from most to least frequent).

1. You changed storage.use_mysql without migrating data

By default use_mysql: false → balances.yml. If you set it to true without migrating, the plugin loads the vault_balances table which will be empty.

Solution:

1. Set use_mysql: false back temporarily.
2. Export the current balances (there are plugins or scripts to dump YAML → CSV).
3. Import into MySQL with LOAD DATA LOCAL INFILE or similar.
4. Re-enable use_mysql: true.

This also works the other way around: if you switched from MySQL to YAML without a dump, balances.yml will be empty.

2. Reload error: Spigot/Paper /reload breaks the maps

/reload (PlugMan, etc.) is NOT supported. During onDisable → onEnable, SimpleEconomy has this critical block in loadCurrencyDefinitions():

Map<String, Map<UUID, Double>> savedBalances = new HashMap<>(currencyData.size() * 2);
// current RAM balances are copied into savedBalances
// then currencyDefs.clear(); currencyData.clear();
// and they are re-inserted reading from disk.

If an external /reload aborts mid-process, the copy does not happen and RAM balances remain empty before save(), being permanently lost.

NEVER USE /RELOAD. Restart the entire server or, at most, /vault reload which only reloads config.yml + messages.yml without touching structures.

3. offline-uuid-fallback changed from false → true (or the other way)

The key is the UUID. If your server was online-mode=true and you change to online-mode=false (or change the server IP and server.properties gets regenerated), all UUIDs change.

Example: Notch in online-mode = UUID 069a79f4-44e9-4726-a5be-fca90e38aaf5. Notch in offline-mode = UUID b27b1b5e-1d16-3f6b-8f0b-16f9a30c14e2. To Vault they are two DIFFERENT players.

Recovery: use the EssentialsImportService technique (same concept: iterate balances.yml, resolve names to UUIDs in current mode, and write to the new destination).

4. You accidentally deleted balances.yml / bank_balances.yml

It's the most obvious cause but happens by carelessness. The plugin regenerates empty files if they don't exist → everything goes to 0.

Preventive measures:

• Make automatic daily backups of plugins/Vault/
• Enable storage.use_mysql: true (less risk of loss due to file deletion)
• Bank notes and physical notes have HMAC, but if you delete .note-secret.dat, upon regeneration no old notes will validate (see Notes FAQ).

5. You changed the currencies.default section to another name

Before:

# No currencies section → everything under currency.*

Now:

currencies:
  euros:  # <- NOT called "default"
    symbol: "€"

SimpleEconomy picks as defaultCurrencyId the first entry or the one marked default: true. If balances were stored under the default currency and you rename the ID to euros, the data is still there but under a different key.

Rule: the first currency you define (and the one you want the legacy API to use) must still be called default, or mark one with default: true.