Plaid INVALID_BODY 'body could not be parsed as JSON' when passing datetime to phone_number_verified_time

TL;DR

For "INVALID_BODY": pass a timezone-aware datetime, not a naive one. datetime.fromtimestamp(0) has no tzinfo, so the SDK serializes it without the 'Z' suffix and Plaid rejects the body. Use datetime.datetime.now(datetime.timezone.utc) or datetime.datetime(2021, 11, 1, 0, 0, tzinfo=datetime.timezone.utc).

INVALID_BODY

Steps

1. Pass a timezone-aware datetime, not a naive one. datetime.fromtimestamp(0) has no tzinfo, so the SDK serializes it without the 'Z' suffix and Plaid rejects the body. Use datetime.datetime.now(datetime.timezone.utc) or datetime.datetime(2021, 11, 1, 0, 0, tzinfo=datetime.timezone.utc). You can't pass a string instead - the field is type-checked and raises ApiTypeError for str. A maintainer acknowledged the error message is misleading (the body IS valid JSON) and filed an internal issue to be less picky about datetime formats. Source: https://github.com/plaid/plaid-python/issues/414

When to use

You are seeing this: With plaid-python 9.3.0, passing a Python datetime to LinkTokenCreateRequestUser.phone\number\verified\time failed with INVALID\BODY / error\message: 'body could not be parsed as JSON'. Use this skill when you run into "Plaid INVALIDBODY 'body could not be parsed as JSON' when passing datetime to phonenumberverified_time".

When not to use

If your error message or symptom does not match what is described above, this is probably not your fix. Search for your exact error text instead of forcing this one to fit.

Versions

Versions mentioned in the source: plaid-python 9.3.0. If you are on something much newer or older, the details may have shifted.

Why this happens

The original report does not dig into a root cause. It documents the symptom and the fix that resolved it.

Sources

• https://github.com/plaid/plaid-python/issues/414