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Re:Planned Spending in Projected Cash Flow

@cubateve

Right now, the spending plan's planned spending -does- -not- apply to any particular account. In my case, I have 3-4 checking accounts, plus a number of credit cards - it's not clear which account the planned spending should apply to, should it deduct it from one, multiple or somehow all accounts.

Also, when spending plan says so much is left per day, that only has to do with budget for the calendar month and does not reflect any actual balances.

EDIT: Assuming i don't get paid the first of the month and only the first of the month, cash flow could be negative for earlier parts of the month if it was done the way you suggest. That would ba. problem for me

-Rob

There is an existing idea you can add your vote to (I'll note that this should be merged to the people who can do that): [removed link to merged thread]

@DryHeat
Planned Spending in Projected Cash Flow:
I think this could be an optional feature, toggled on or off. Simplifi already calculates a “$xx.xx left per day” in the Spending Plan under “Left this month.” A similar approach could be used in Projected Cash Flow — dividing the remaining Planned Spending by the number of days left in the month and showing it as a dotted line for estimated daily outflow.

This would give users two views that could be overlaid: One based on actual bills, and one that includes anticipated discretionary spending. It wouldn’t need to forecast far ahead — even just 1–2 months would be helpful. (I wouldn't expect it to reliably project any further out because life and budges will change.) Since Planned Spending can be set up in advance and use recurring series, this could be a flexible and user-controlled enhancement.

Watchlists and reimbursements:
I re-checked my setup and confirmed that reimbursements do reduce the “Spent so far” total when they’re in the same category and month. What caused confusion was that future-dated recurring transactions (which I use to simulate weekly spending) are also included in “Spent so far.” Understanding that now, I like the functionality but I think the label is misleading. Something like “Planned + Actual” or “Total Activity” would better reflect what’s being shown.

@SRC54
Sofi and Vaults
SoFi uses Vaults, which are sub-accounts within savings. All money stays in savings, and anything not assigned to a vault is available to fund transactions. When I make a purchase I do so from my checking account and SoFi automatically moves the needed funds from savings to checking in real time — no manual transfers required. This lets me keep all my money earning interest while still covering transactions seamlessly. This setup creates some challenges in Simplifi (as outlined in the original post), but it’s a great system for maximizing interest and organizing funds. I do maintain a (basically inactive) local checking account with a CU in case I need something physical, but I do have free ATM usage with Sofi which mitigates that need.

@cubateve

Planned Spending in Projected Cash Flow:

I understand what you are proposing to be something like this: If I have 15 days left in the month and $1500 left unspent in my planned spending, then the Projected Cash Flow should show some kind of estimated expense transaction of $100 on each of the remaining days in the month.

Personally, I would opt out of that. I don't think I would find it helpful. Perhaps others would like it.

Watchlists and reimbursements:

It's good that reimbursements are working correctly for you.

But I agree with you that the handling of future-dated transactions in Watchlists is a problem. Counting those as "Spent so far" makes no sense to me. That issue was discussed on another thread (see below), but I don't know if there is any plan to fix that.

The mobile app allows you to filter out this month and last month. It would be nice to select specific date ranges on the app.

The browser does not allow you to filter out either. It would be nice to be able to do this on both.

@RobWilk, I totally agree and have been a Quicken user for the same period of time as you. While waiting for this to appear in Simplifi, I have devised a "work around" using the flags. When I schedule a paymewnt for the next month or have recuring payments, I have selected the flag of Orange. I do have to set it manually, but that is better than nothing. The only missing piece is a list of the specific accounts with the orange flag for future payments. That is also a missing piece as well.

+1

Need this feature, it's a basic feature for any finance management tool.