Thanks Blair; I had initially thought split transactions were memorized and realized after a few months that they were not. I was trying to take one income amount (pay deposit) and split it into different income buckets. This would allow saving for the accrual type of accounts without any extra effort and would keep the money separate. It worked well but I had to re-do the splits each month. After reading Matt's response (which follows yours) I realized I would have to go back to the expense rollover approach.
I did however come up with a solution to help with the discipline. I proposed to Kevin a new feature that alters the graph at the bottom of the screen. The graph could have two (or more) options (pulldown menu) with one option showing the current graph. The current graph shows the actual and scheduled transactions. The new option would show future values based on the spending plan. This way you would see immediately the growth and months where actual spending would occur. This would handle fixed month payments (seasonal expenses, insurances, etc.). I am not sure this request will be accepted but I felt if a person sees the upcoming expense they would have greater control. Dan On Dec 16, 10:04 pm, Blair Watkinson <[email protected]> wrote: > > Is it possible to repeat split transactions? > > Dan, currently, there is no functionality within MoneyWell to repeat > split transactions. You could repeat multiple individual transactions > if you needed to forecast, and then delete them when the actual > transaction comes, applying the appropriate split to the actual > transaction, but I don't think doing this will help you do what you're > trying to do. > > I use expense buckets to accrue money for future expenses. Some > examples include Vehicle Maintenance (everything on the car except > fuel and insurance, the former I want to track separately, and the > latter is a fixed expense), and Gifts (I have Christmas Gifts, > Birthday Gifts, etc, that accrue until the money is needed). > > With these buckets, I simply do not transfer money from them to other > buckets. Every time I make a transfer, or money flow, I am making a > choice to not spend money in a certain category and instead spend it > on something else. MoneyWell makes that choice very clear to me, and > so when I make these choices, like spending more in entertainment in a > particular month than I have allotted, MoneyWell forces me to face the > consequences of that choice. > > I do not always transfer money into expense buckets from other buckets > just because they are negative. If the bucket is pretty close to 0, I > will let the negative balance float until the next month rather than > transferring money to the next month. For example, if I spent too > much money in clothing this month, I will not move money from Vehicle > Maintenance to cover the amount. I'll just let the clothing deficit > sit there until the next month. As long as I don't have to spend all > the money from all my buckets this month (a very unlikely scenario, > especially because I have two savings buckets which just continue to > accrue indefinitely), I will not have a problem where I am spending > more money that I have (without formally making the transfer, which I > would have to correct the next month, my Savings buckets cover the > deficits in my other buckets). > > If I understand your question completely, it sounds like you are > trying to find a method within MoneyWell to prevent you from > overspending if you do not have the discipline not to transfer money > from one type of allocation to another. Fundamentally, I do not think > that there is any software or practice that can resolve this problem. > What MoneyWell does is help to provide the information for people who > want to practice discipline with their spending--it makes the > consequences of choices clear. There are many things that you can do > to make spending harder, but ultimately, it will always come down to a > choice to spend that money that you have to make. The choices we > make, with money, or anything else, reflect our desires, if we tend to > spend money on things we shouldn't so there isn't enough money on > future expenses, our desires must change. Only when these desires > have changed, and they are manifest in different ways of thinking and > new habits, will we truly have changed behavior. MoneyWell can't > change our desires, but it is great tool to help us develop new habits. > > Grace to you, > Blair > > On Dec 13, 2008, at 10:34 AM, Dan Harrison wrote: > > > > > I have used MoneyWell for the past five months and really like the > > design and cash flow concepts. Great work Kevin! > > > I have one area where I would like your (or the user community) advice > > and this deals with an area I call accruals. The concept is that we > > all have expenses that do not occur regularly but need to be in our > > budget. Examples would be automobile, landscaping, medical, and other > > expenses. I initially defined a monthly amount in my spending plan > > that flowed to the appropriate expense bucket. This works and the flow > > of non-used expense money to the next month would handle the so called > > accrual. What I found dangerous was the temptation to move this money > > to other buckets which would not leave enough money when the actual > > expense occurred. > > > My second attempt was to create income buckets where I would then > > allocate the accrual amounts leaving the expense accounts for the > > actual expenses when they occurred. I would transfer money from the > > income accrual to pay the expense. This works well but I had to > > create split transactions for all the accrual accounts when income was > > deposited in the bank. I defined my income transaction as repeating > > every month but it doesn't look like the application wants to repeat > > split transactions (only the master transaction amount). Is it > > possible to repeat split transactions? > > > Do you (or anyone in the community) have an approach for allocating > > income into a holding bucket (accrual) and then transfer this to an > > actual expense when the expense occurs? --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "No Thirst Software User Forum" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/no-thirst-software?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
