I have never been very good at keeping an eye on whats coming in and going out. I think since losing a better paying job 3 years ago I have been slowing going south.

Does anyone use a piece of software or an app that will make nice bar charts etc, or would excel/numbers be my best choice.

I found the pear budget excel spreadsheet to be really helpful:

https://pearbudget.com/spreadsheet

Nice and clear and it’s just Excel, so you can add charts and so on as you see fit 🙂

I use ‘Home Budget Calculator’ on my iPhone (paid for the customisable version at about £2) – nothing fancy but it lists all outgoings and income etc and is very easy to use – simply tells me what I spend each month and exactly how much I have left.

They also do a spending log (to keep tabs of all the one-off payments etc) app but I have never used that.

Pretty https://www.mint.com/

That mint looks pretty good, I’ll have a look tonight. Is it free?

I just use Excel. It doesn’t take long to make yourself a basic template that then lets you enter your wages and any other income, plus another column for your expenditure, giving you an ‘available’ running total. I’m not particularly hot on graphs, but I know Excel has the capacity to generate them.

its a mindset not an app that you need. you dont need a graph to tell you you’re skint.

pen and paper is fine. write every spend down, then re-read it at the end of the month.

If you need a spreadsheet to track your outgoings then you probably have too many (cough, that’s not a dig but an observation)
We all go through issues like this sometime or other. There is nothing to be gained by buying yourself an app when if you have a lappy with Excel on it it’ll be more than capable of doing the Job.

Set up like this:

A) Income = £’000
B) Expenses = £’000
C) Nett or balance = £’000

A-B = C

Then go buy beer.

Can you not look at your bank balance or am I being dim. If its going up save some/more and if itsgoing down each month spend less. How hard does it have to be.

i get paid quarterly. everything in life goes out monthly.

easy enough to sort yourself out mate.

i basically stick everything in a pot, then allow myself x a week.

pay myself x every Wednesday. if i have some left, i either cream it back into the big pot to play with at the end/put in savings next pay day, or buy something nice.

so yeh, two bank accounts – or a split online saver type thing. limit yourself to a very clear weekly figure. if you go over it. no going out/buying owt till the following mini payday.

easy non?

Same here.

I’ve just installed an iPad app called ‘Accounts’. Got well reviewed on the app store, and it does all the charting/forecasting stuff.

I haven’t finished tapping in all my standing orders etc yet so can’t comment on it really, but it seems quite good so far.

Excel and online access to accounts help keep me in check, I just need to remember that credit cards limits are not a target to achieve but a limit to stay well back from 🙂 (I do pay it off monthly so no need for concern!)

Can you not look at your bank balance or am I being dim.

I want to know what I have been spending excess money on partying, fuel, food etc.

tracknicko, that sounds like a great idea, after I get paid I will pay myself x amount! I already have 2 current accounts so it should be easy to implement.

We got summonsed to the bank when we were about 19. My and my wife( girlfriend at the time) got told off by a lady called Diane Sharpe.

Anyhow. She set us up a bills account. Changed all of our direct debits so that they came out of it. Set up two standing orders to pay into tge bills account on both of our pay days and told us that what was left in the current account was ours. I’m 33 now and this arrangement still stands. It works fantastically.

Excel, have used it for years, works for me, whack all the standing orders in and then each transaction and you know what is left, I keep that amount on a note in my wallet next to cash card and update each time I spend 🙂

I use http://www.moneydashboard.com
Its great and links live into your banks so pulls all the data automatically. No importing statements in like MS Money or the like. You can then tag all your transactions and it produces reports or you can export to various formats. And its free 🙂

its a mindset not an app that you need. you dont need a graph to tell you you’re skint.

pen and paper is fine. write every spend down, then re-read it at the end of the month.

+1 Why does everyone need an app for everything?

+1 Why does everyone need an app for everything?

there are forums where you could get someone to write an app for you to find that out

If you need an ‘app’ or a spreadsheet to work out why your’e skint every month, I reckon your’e ****.

there are forums where you could get someone to write an app for you to find that out

Where?

Update! Mint is a North American only program, so I’m trying out money dashboard. It’s not the nicest user interface but excel is no looker either!

If its an android phone you’ve got, check out the AnMoney app.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.zvasvari.anmoneyp&hl=en

There’s a free version or you can cough up a few £s for the full version. I find it invaluable and helps me keep track of all our finances.

If it’s an iphone you’ve got, have a look at Account Tracker. I used it before and found it worked similarly well.
http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/account-tracker/id325834957?mt=8&affId=1398846&ign-mpt=uo%3D2

Both are UK friendly and have the facility to make pretty bar charts to show where you’re haemorrhaging money from.