EA App Chat/Friend Notifications not appearing while in game

Hey all; been having issues with my EA app on Windows for months now.. does anyone know of a fix?

Notifications do not work at all; there's no sound for them, no pop-ups, nothing. I've tried turning them off and on; restarting both the app and my PC, as well as uninstalling EA altogether. 

I just want to be able to know if friends message me while I'm playing, but apparently thats too much to ask for.

In addition.. my in-game overlay also doesn't work. I press Shift + F1 and nothing happens. Is anyone else having this issue? I never even knew EA had an overlay as it's never once come up.

I really do miss Origin some days..