Best Of

@scribblerjane

Have you set any of these transfers up as Recurring Series? I found that helped Simplifi recognize transfers.

@cubateve

You are right about Simplifi's Projected Cash Flow … depending on how you use Planned Spend, there can be lots of expenses that it doesn't take into account. I don't find it as useful as the Spending Plan.

On the other hand, I think the Spending Plan budgeting approach works best for folks who are able to (and willing to) keep enough cash in their checking accounts so as not to worry about the balance from day to day. (I know some folks like to keep their cash at a minimum and move everything to investments, for example.)

But the Spending Plan is very focused on how you progress month-by-month, not on cash on hand. The question is, "Did you spend (or obligate) more than you took in? Or vice versa?" That works well in the long run, but doesn't provide the day-to-day balance projections that some folks might find more helpful.

A few weeks ago, I posted about the workarounds I was using to simulate weekly spending in Simplifi — specifically creating recurring placeholder transactions for groceries, gas, and medical to make up for the fact that Planned Spending doesn’t show in Projected Cash Flow. I'm posting an update to what I've found using that strategy and why I'm making changes. Hopefully what I've learned and experienced will help others struggling with the same challenges!

I’ve decided to remove the weekly placeholders and shift to a cleaner monthly budgeting strategy. Here’s why:

• Weekly placeholders added friction. They helped with short-term cash visibility, but made it harder to see where I was within my monthly budget. If I overspent one week, I had to manually adjust the next — which felt tedious and disconnected from my actual goals. Without saved reports, it took extra time to review where I stood in spending relative to my budget.
• I’m learning to trust the budget. Instead of asking “Can I afford this right now?” based on cash flow (and trying to squeeze in a purchase I hadn't budgeted for), I’m shifting to “Is this in my budget?” or “Where does this come from within my budget?” That mindset helps me plan better and avoid impulse spending.
• I’ve adopted a $100 rollover threshold. If I underspend in a category and the rollover exceeds $100, I move the excess to my Life Happens vault. If I overspend, I pull from that vault to cover it. This keeps things flexible without losing control and provides me with a monthly cadence of accountability to my budget.
• Yes, I lose some projected cash flow visibility. But I’ve realized that trying to forecast every dollar weeks ahead isn’t as helpful as sticking to a well-built monthly budget and adjusting only when necessary.

Simplifi still has limitations — saved reports, reimbursement handling, and cash flow forecasting could be improved — but this change should help me simplify my workflow and reduce the mental load of constant adjustments or remembering where things stand.

If you’re using weekly placeholders or struggling to reconcile cash flow with budget discipline, I hope this helps. Sometimes the best way to simplify is to trust the system you (or somebody else) has already built!

@RobWilk — "Is that a bug or a design situation?"

Beats me. @Coach Natalie said she believed completed Savings Goals "aren't intended to be deleted," although I have seen posts from others advising to delete SGs to fix various problems. So who knows?

In Planned Spend, editing or deleting an Expense Series applies to future months only and does not change the history. (At least that's what I remember it doing.) SGs should work the same way. But right now it looks like Simplifi considers the current behavior to be correct.

So I guess I could create an idea post. But for now, like some others, I have abandoned SGs as unworkable.

American Express still does not allow OAuth on whichever server my data is on. Discover is also not on the list even though they are one of the 4 credit card networks and a top 10 credit card company.

I voted for this as well.

I tend to edit the series when I am looking at them in the Spending Plan or when I see it coming up in the particular account. One shortcut I employ is to choose Edit Reminder, and at the bottom of the window that opens, I can then choose Edit Series. I think this works in most cases. It saves a step or two.

Good luck Max. I hope the new app works for you.

The Check # column missing is a bug that will be fixed in the next couple of weeks: