Toshl Finance Blog

Edit Categories and Tags (Web App)

When you signed up on Toshl, your new account already included categories and tags that should cover most types of entries that you make. If you migrated your account from the previous version of Toshl, just the default categories were added and you could convert your pre-existing tags to the new system.

While we did our best to cover most cases of what kind of spending and earning you can do, we all have our individual circumstances. That’s why we made it easy to add new categories and tags, or modify the existing ones. This tutorial will help you tweak your category and tag system just the way you like it, as well as introduce some more general principles of expense and income categorisation in Toshl.
First, the basic rules:
1. Each entry (expense or income) must have a category
2. There can be only one category on each entry
3. Tags are optional
4. An entry can have multiple tags
5. Expense and income categories and tags are separate
6. Any tag can be used with any category, but just among the same type (rule 5.)
You can see these rules in action when adding an expense. Amount, category, date and account (if you have more than 1) are the required information to save a new expense.
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All the categories and tags that you’ve used in the selected time span will show up on the Expenses and Incomes sections.
What about the entire system? ALL the categories and tags, even those that you haven’t used?
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Click on the “Edit categories” button.
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Each of the squares represents one category. The categories are sorted alphabetically. You can also see how many expenses or incomes use that category and how many tags are usually used with it. Why “usually”? Eeeeasy young padawan, we’ll get there soon. Click on one of the squares to open category details.
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The tags that you see on category details are put there because you most likely use them together with that category. Categories and tags are not strictly hierarchical and a tag can be used on an entry together with any category. For example: if I put the tag “books” into category “Leisure”, it doesn’t mean that I can’t use the tag “books” together with category “Gifts” on a different expense. Tags are put into categories merely to help you better suggest the right tags when adding an entry.
 
For example, when you’re adding an expense and you have already chosen the category “Food & Drinks” and you then click in the tags field, the tags that will be suggest the first, are the ones which were put in that category, weighed by how often you use them. You can choose any tag you like though, even if it was put in a different category.
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Categories
Add a new category
Click on the last of the category squares, with the + sign on it. Pick a title for the category and save. That’s it.
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You can also add new categories when adding a new expense or income. Just type it into the category field and press Enter to add it as a new category.
Rename a category
Click on the category square to get the details.
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Click on the “Edit” button top right.
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You can rename the category by typing a new title and saving it.
Delete a category
Click on the category square to get the details. Click on the “Edit” button top right. Click the Delete button.
If you have expenses that still use this category, Toshl will ask you what to do with them. You can choose to assign them all a different category or delete the expenses as well. Consider this carefully, it cannot be undone.
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Merge a category
When looking at all the categories, drag and drop one category square on top of the other. Toshl will ask you to confirm the merging.
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The category title that will be kept is the second one, onto which you have dragged the first category to. All the expenses from the first category will then be marked with the new – merged category.
Tags
Add a new tag
Click on a category. Click on “Add a new tag”, pick a title for the tag. Save.
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You can also add new tags when adding a new expense or income. Just type it into the tag field and press Enter to add it as a new tag.
Rename a tag
Click on a category, in category details click on the tag you want to rename. Click “Edit tag”.
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Pick a new tag title and save.
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Delete a tag
Click on a category, in category details click on the tag you want to delete. Click “Edit tag”.
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Click on the “Delete” button.
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If any expenses use this tag it will simply be removed from the expense. The expense will continue to exist.
Move tag to a different category
Click on a category, in category details click on the tag you want to move. Click “Move to another category”.
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Moving the tag to another category will not alter your expenses in any way. This is simply so we better know which tags to suggest when adding an expense and you have already chosen a category.
Merge tag with a category
Click on a category, in category details click on the tag you want to merge. Click “Merge with this category”.
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When you merge with the category, the tag will cease to exist and will be removed on all the entries that use it.
 Leave tag outside of categories
There are some tags that are often used across many categories and can’t fit into a single one. We like to call them “meta-tags”. A typical example of this would be the “travel” tag which can be used with almost any sort of expense while you’re traveling. Another typical example would be tags that you use to note the person who paid.
It doesn’t matter if you put them in a single category, since you can still use that tag with any other as well. But to make things clearer, especially for those who migrated from Toshl v1, we added the option to keep tags out of a category altogether.
Click on a category, in category details click on the tag you want to leave outside. Click “Leave tag outside of categories”.
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Merge tags
To merge a tag, first click on a tag, then click “Merge with tag”. This will open a window where you can choose among your other tags, to find the one to merge your selected tag with. You can merge two tags or multiple ones.
The suggested title of the new – merged – tag will be based on the second tag you chose for merging. You can however change the title of the new tag to whatever you want. After the merging is confirmed, all expenses or incomes that previously used one of the tags you selected for merging, will now use the new tag.
Convert a tag to a financial account
This option exists more as migration help for people who have migrated their data from the Toshl v1 where multiple financial accounts were not available. If you used a tag as an extra tag that noted which account it was spent from (e.g. credit card, bank account, cash etc.) you can now convert that tag into a financial account.
Use this only on tags that you used along with other tags on an expense. The tag being converted to an account should not be the only one on a tag.
This feature will likely be removed in the future once everyone has finished the migration process from v1.
Posted in Uncategorized

Left to Spend – The Gist of Your Finances in 1 Number (iOS)

As the name implies, this big green number tells you how much money is remaining for you to spend this month. It gives you a quick information on where you stand financially right now, while keeping your budgeting goals in mind.
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If you have set up a monthly budget, all the expenses in this month will be deducted from the budget amount and what you get is the “Left to spend” number.

If you don’t have a monthly budget for all expenses, expenses will be deducted from your incomes this month to get the “left to spend” number.

 

Left to spend with a monthly budget for all expenses
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Left to spend without a monthly budget for all expenses
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Overspent

If you have already spent beyond your means or over budget, the “left to spend” number turns to the red “overspent”. It shows you how far over your monthly budget or your earnings you already went this month.
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Left per day

The smaller number below “left to spend” tells you how much you can spend each day by the end of the month to keep your finances aligned with your goals. The number is simply the current “left to spend” number divided by the amount of days remaining in the current financial month.

 

Reduce spending to

If you have already overspent this month, the smaller number below will turn to the “reduce spending to” mode. This number tells you how much you should have spent per day to get through the month normally. It’s your monthly budget amount or the monthly income (if there is no budget), divided by the number of days in the month.

 

Including planned expenses – or not

The “left to spend” number can either include planned expenses and incomes – or not. Planned expenses are those which you have already entered in this financial month, but they are still in the future – they haven’t been due yet. These can be regular bills that you know are coming, but haven’t paid yet, incomes that should come in the future, but haven’t yet… You get the idea. You can set these to be included in “left to spend” and all the graphs. Tap the time span & accounts indicator on the top right. In the right sidebar that opens up, tap the name of the month on top. Make sure you’re in the “My financial month” tab. Turn the switch “Show planned expenses in graphs” either ON or OFF. Your wish shall be our command.
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Posted in iOS Tutorials, Tips & Tricks, Tutorials

Left to Spend – The Gist of Your Finances in One Number (Web App)

As the name implies, this big green number tells you how much money is remaining for you to spend this month. It gives you quick information on where you stand financially right now, while keeping your budgeting goals in mind.

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If you have set up a monthly budget, all the expenses in this month will be deducted from the budget amount and what you get is the “Left to spend” number.
If you don’t have a monthly budget for all expenses, expenses will be deducted from your incomes this month to get the “left to spend” number.
Left to spend with a monthly budget for all expenses
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Left to spend without a monthly budget for all expenses
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Overspent
If you have already spent beyond your means or over budget, the “left to spend” number turns to the red “overspent”. It shows you how far over your monthly budget or your earnings you already went this month.
Blog_tut_5_4b
Left per day
The smaller number below left to spend tells you how much you can spend each day by the end of the month to keep your finances aligned with your goals. The number is simply the current “left to spend” number divided by the amount of days remaining in the current financial month.
Reduce spending to
If you have already overspent this month, the smaller number below will turn to the “reduce spending to” mode. This number tells you how much you should have spent per day to get through the month normally. It’s your monthly budget amount or the monthly income (if there is no budget), divided by the number of days in the month.
Including planned expenses – or not
The “left to spend” number can either include planned expenses and incomes – or not. Planned expenses are those which you have already entered in this financial month, but they are still in the future – they haven’t been due yet. These can be regular bills that you know are coming, but haven’t paid yet, incomes that should come in the future, but haven’t yet… You get the idea. You can set these to be included in “left to spend” and all the graphs by clicking the “time span” setting on the top of the page. In the overlay that opens up, turn the switch “Show planned expenses in graphs” either ON or OFF. Your wish shall be our command.
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Posted in Personal finance, Tips & Tricks, Tutorials, Web App Tutorials

How to Set Up Your Budgets and Control Your Spending (iOS)

Knowing where your money goes is an important step. It can help you rein in your spending, as you become aware of your weak points. But sometimes you need to grab the bull by the horns and firmly set the direction in which you want your finances to go. Budgets are here to help you do that.

Consider what your goals are. Is the situation dire and you need to seriously reduce your spending to the minimum? Or would you just like some more money left over to start some savings? Want a friendly reminder in case the spending goes over your usual average? This consideration will determine your basic budgeting strategy.

 

1. Set a monthly budget for all expenses

Take a look at how much you usually spend each month altogether. Based on what your goals are, pick a number that will be your monthly spending goal. If you’re with the easygoing, “just monitoring” crowd, you can keep it much the same as it was in the previous months. If you want to spend much less than before, reduce the number accordingly.

Now let’s get to the practical part.
Go to the Budgets section. Tap the navigation icon on the top left or simply swipe from the left edge of the screen.
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Tap the blue + button on the bottom left to add a budget.
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Leave the “budget for” on All expenses. Tap the “Time period” section below.
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Leave the setting to the budget period of 1 month. You can add other types of budgets later on, we recommend starting with a monthly budget which will be in sync with your financial month. Monthly budgets for all expenses also play nice with other features. They get included in the River flow graph, as well as get a more prominent place in the Budgets section.

If you want, you can also make the budget start further in the past using the “Budget starts on” setting. This is useful if you have data in Toshl from earlier periods.

Tap the row labeled “Amount”.
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Remember that monthly spending goal number you chose before? This would be the time to enter it. Once you click in the amount field you also get some additional options:
– “number” enter the amount as a regular number which stays the same every month until you change it
– “income –“ this will sum up all the incomes in the current financial month and subtract a number of your choosing. If you stick to your budget, this will be the amount of money you save each month.
– “income +” your budget will be your income plus the number you chose. Probably not ideal for most, but if you can draw on a reserve of cash to add to your monthly income, this is the solution for you.
– “% of income” great to set a proportion of income you want to save. If you want to save 20 % of your income each month, set the budget to 80 % of your income and stick to it.

Whether you want the number to be static or adjust automatically to your income, your call. You know your circumstances best. If things change, or you manage to save more you can always change it later.
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The next step is simply a sum up of what you chose so far. If you’re satisfied with the choices, tap the tick icon on the top right of the screen to Save the budget.

Your first monthly budget. Congratulations!
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While we covered the basic things you need to set up your budgets in previous steps, there are a few more options that you can use once you nudge closer toward becoming a budgeting savant:

Accounts – You can limit the budget to follow only certain accounts. That way only expenses coming from those accounts will be counted in the budget. For the start, it’s probably better to leave it to “All accounts”
Date – This defines when a specific budget starts. If you left the budget on the monthly period, the default will be the start of the current month. If you have already been using Toshl for a longer period of time, you can set that start date in the past and budgets will be calculated automatically for all those past periods. Neat trick, eh?
Move remaining funds to next period – Also known as “the rollover”. If you set this to ON, any surplus or lack of funds in the budget will be transferred to the next budget period. If you really want to be rigorous about your spending, use this and see how good you are at self-discipline. If the sins of the past months become too much of a burden, you can edit the rollover amount separately later on. But you’ll know you’ve cheated on the inside. ;)
Title – We automatically generate a title for your budgets based on the settings you chose for each one, but you can always change it to something custom if you so desire.

 

2. Add a monthly budget for specific categories

Not all spending is the same. Some costs are relatively fixed or a bit harder to change, like rent for example, while others are more flexible and more easily change month to month based on your habits.

Think about what kind of spending gets you in trouble. Which are the unnecessary things you really could do without, or at least spend a bit less on them. All the tech gadgets, drinks, games, gardening supplies… ? Your call. Just don’t say “alimony”. Not cool! ;)

If you’ve been using Toshl for a while, it’s best to browse through your past months in expense graphs and see where your money leaks are.

Once you’ve thought about it, go to the Budgets section again, click the blue + button on the bottom left to Add a budget.

This time, in the “Budget for” section choose this to be a budget for a category.

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You’ll see your categories listed so you can choose which category or categories you wish to track with this budget. We’ll go with Food & Drinks this time.

Next, let’s scroll down and tap the Amount setting below.

How much you can spend on this specific category is up to you. If you have past data base it on that, see how much you spent and what your goal is. If you prefer, you can also define it as a percentage of your income, but that will probably take a bit more fine-tuning in this case.

If you’re satisfied with your choices, that’s all there is to it. Click “Save”.
If you’ve used some more advanced features like starting the budget in the past or for certain accounts before, you can set these to match with this budget as well.

 

3. Budgets for more categories?

If you’ve identified multiple categories that you need to keep a vigilant eye over, by all means, add them as well. If you want, you can make a budget for every single category, the same way we have been doing this so far in this tutorial.

Monthly budgets for categories and the one for all expenses are a bit different than the rest of the budgets. Because they all use the same monthly period and the categories add up to 100 % of the expenses sum, this is reflected in the budget list.

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The top budget is your general monthly budget for all expenses. The ones below each represent a percentage of the total monthly budget. That’s why the little progress bars beneath each category budget are of different lengths. The category budget amounts all represent a percentage of the total monthly budget. The categories for which you have not yet made a budget for are covered in the “Remaining budgets” section. That way you get a rough picture of how your monthly budget for all expenses is distributed among the categories.

 

4. What about other, non-monthly budgets?

In this tutorial, we covered the most basic budget that we think would be most beneficial for most people to set up at first. We also offer a lot of different budget options for your specific needs. You don’t need to base your budget based on your financial month, although they’re displayed a bit more nicely if you do (see point 3.).

 

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Budgets can be based on almost any time period, be it a custom number of days, weeks, months, even years.
They can be set to track all expenses, some categories, exclude some categories, tags or exclude some tags. They can also track your budget using all financial accounts, or just a few you selected.
You can have the budgets transfer the remaining or lacking funds to the next period (rollover) or see them individually for each period.

Explore Toshl, try the different options and we’re sure you’ll find a way to budget which suits your needs the best.

Posted in iOS Tutorials, Tips & Tricks, Tutorials

How to Set Up Your Budgets and Control Your Spending (Web App)

Knowing where your money goes is an important step which can help you with reining in your spending, just by knowing your weak points. But sometimes you need to grab the bull by the horns and firmly set the direction in which you want your finances to go. Budgets are here to help you do that.

Consider what your goals are. Is the situation dire and you need to seriously reduce your spending to the minimum? Or would you just like some more money left over to start some savings? Want a friendly reminder in case the spending goes over your usual average? This consideration will determine your basic budgeting strategy.

1. Set a monthly budget for all expenses

Take a look at how much you usually spend each month all together. Based on what your goals are, pick a number that will be your monthly spending goal. If you’re with the easygoing, “just monitoring” crowd, you can keep it much the same as it was in the previous months. If you want to spend much less than before, reduce the number accordingly.
Now let’s get to the practical part.
Go to the Budgets section.
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Click the blue + button on the bottom right to add a budget.
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Leave it on All expenses, click Next.
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Leave the setting to the budget period of 1 month. You can add other types of budgets later on, we recommend starting with a monthly budget which will be in sync with your financial month. This will also enable some nice features later on.
Click Next.
Remember that monthly spending goal number you chose before? This would be the time to enter it. Once you click in the amount field you also get some additional options:
– “number” enter the amount as a regular number which stays the same every month until you change it
– “income –“ this will sum up all the incomes in the current financial month and subtract a number of your choosing. If you stick to your budget, this will be the amount of money you save each month.
– “income +” your budget will be your income plus the number you chose. Probably not ideal for most, but if you can draw on a reserve of cash to add to your monthly income, this is the solution for you.
– “% of income” great to set a proportion of income you want to save. If you want to save 20 % of your income each month, set the budget to 80 % of your income and stick to it.
Whether you want the number to be static or adjust automatically to your income, your call. You know your circumstances best. If things change, or you manage to save more you can always change it later.
blog_tut_2_4
The next step is simply a sum up of what you chose so far. If you’re satisfied with the choices you can click Save, but if you’re wishing for some more options, click “Show more” on the bottom.blog_tut_2_5
As you see some new options showed up:
Accounts – You can limit the budget to follow only certain accounts. That way only expenses coming from those accounts will be counted in the budget. For the start, it’s probably better to leave it to “All accounts”
Date – This defines when a specific budget starts. If you left the budget on the monthly period, the default will be the start of the current month. If you have already been using Toshl for a longer period of time, you can set that start date in the past and budgets will be calculated automatically for all those past periods. Neat trick, eh?
Move remaining funds to next period – Also known as the “rollover”. If you set this to ON, any surplus or lack of funds in the budget will be transferred to the next budget period. If you really want to be rigorous about your spending, use this and see how good you are at self-discipline. If the sins of the past months become too much of a burden, you can edit the rollover amount separately later on. But you’ll know deep down that you’ve cheated. ;)
Title – We automatically generate a title for your budgets based on the settings you chose for each one, but you can always change it to something custom if you so desire.
Once you’re satisfied with all the choices. Click “Save”.
Your first monthly budget. Congratulations!

2. Add a monthly budget for specific categories

Not all spending is the same. Some costs are relatively fixed or a bit harder to change, like rent for example, while others are more flexible and more easily change month to month based on your habits.
Think about what kind of spending gets you in trouble. Which are the unnecessary things you really could do without, or at least spend a bit less on them. All the tech gadgets, drinks, games, gardening supplies… ? Your call. Just don’t say “alimony”. Not cool! ;)
If you’ve been using Toshl for a while, it’s best to browse through your past months in expense graphs and see where your money leaks are.
Once you’ve thought about it, go to the Budgets section again, click the blue + button on the bottom right to Add a budget.
This time, click on the dropdown and choose this to be a budget for a category.
blog_tut_2_6
You’ll see a pie chart of your all time spending per category to help you decide more easily what to save on. Click on the pie chart or chose the category by name below. We’ll go with Food & Drinks this time. Click next.
Keep it on the 1 month period. Click Next.
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How much you can spend on this specific category is up to you. If you have past data base it on that, see how much you spent and what your goal is. If you prefer, you can also define it as a percentage of your income, but that will probably take a bit more fine-tuning in this case.
If you’re satisfied with your choices, that’s all there is to it. Click “Save”.
If you’ve used some more advanced features like starting the budget in the past or for certain accounts before, you can set these to match with this budget as well.

 

3. Budgets for more categories?

If you’ve identified multiple categories that you need to keep a vigilant eye over, by all means, add them as well. If you want, you can make a budget for every single category, the same way we have been doing this so far.
Monthly budgets for categories and the one for all expenses are a bit different than the rest of the budgets. Because they all use the same monthly period and the categories add up to 100 %, this is reflected in the budget list.
blog_tut_2_7
The top budget is your general monthly budget for all expenses. The ones below each represent a percentage of the total monthly budget. That’s why the little progress bars beneath each category budget are of different lengths. The category budget amounts all represent a percentage of the total monthly budget. The categories for which you have not yet made a budget for are covered in the “Remaining budgets” section. That way you get a rough picture of how your monthly budget for all expenses is distributed among the categories.

4. What about other, non-monthly budgets?

In this tutorial, we covered the most basic budget that we think would be most beneficial for most people to set up at first. We also offer a lot of different budget options for your specific needs. You don’t need to base your budget based on your financial month, although they’re displayed a bit more nicely if you do (see point 3.).Capture d'écran 2015-05-25 13.13.08
Budgets can be based on almost any time period, be it a custom number of days, weeks, months, even years.
They can be set to track all expenses, some categories, exclude some categories, tags or exclude some tags. They can also track your budget using all financial accounts, or just a few you selected.
You can have the budgets transfer the remaining or lacking funds to the next period (rollover) or see them individually for each period.
Explore Toshl, try the different options and we’re sure you’ll find a way to budget which suits your needs the best.
Posted in Personal finance, Tips & Tricks, Tutorials, Web App Tutorials