Savings Goals should add back to the Spending Plan when used (2 Merged Votes)

rayhooker
rayhooker Member ✭✭
edited February 6 in Feature Requests

Currently I can create a savings goal that will allow me to reduce the amount available in my spending plan based on an expected contribution. That is good because I can make sure I set the money aside, but the problem comes I "use" the funds. Logically if to contribute reduces the money in my spending plan, then it should add back to the spending plan when used. So whether this is for a big expenditure or some goal, I would think it best to:

  • Add those expenses to the spending plan (e.g., vacation or yearly property tax)
  • Match those with the funds pulled out of savings.
    Right now even if I release the funds in an account, unless I put those funds in an external account not in the spending plan there is no way to recognize their use. A way to do this would be to have a savings goal register that reflects in the spending plan based on month in which the adjustment occurs.
43 votes

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Comments

  • Coach Natalie
    Coach Natalie Administrator, Moderator admin

    Hello @rayhooker,

    Thanks for posting this to the Community!

    I have gone ahead and turned this into an Idea post so that other Users can vote on it. Please be sure to add your vote as well! :wink:

    -Coach Natalie

  • Great idea - this takes the savings goal full circle.
  • BillPayer
    BillPayer Member
    I would like to see the Saving Goal transactions to manage contributing to and taking from these goals.
  • Coach Blake
    Coach Blake Administrator, Moderator admin
    edited June 2021
    Bennett Burt,

    That is a great suggestion! I can see the importance of a feature like that, thank you for bringing it up. It gets my vote!

    -Coach Blake
  • Juan
    Juan Member
    Yes that is a good suggestion. Furthermore withdrawals or additions from goals need to show up in the reports especially net income or some new goal report.  I went on vacation and spent $2,000 that was not relected in my normal spending plan for that month. I withdrew money from my saving goal to cover the extra vacation $2k. However this transaction does not show up in any reports especially net income.  When time passes and i forget what i did to cover $2k vaca in that month and  i run net income report it will shows i’ve spent more than i brought in. Withdrawal and additions into goals are not accounted well in simplifi. 
  • Would love to see something along this line. Seems like a glaring omission that doesn't simplify a spending plan.
  • I feel this is a major missed item in the Spending Plan and Savings Goal section. A lot of the budgeting tools/teaching material over the years has taught people to save small amounts over a set period for a big purchase which is accounted for in the Savings Goal. Great, but the goal is to then use that money on what you were saving it for, not to just keep it in a goal. Yes, you can withdraw the money manually, but then how do you track it? 

    The product owner should have seen this idea in the last 16 months it was posted and prioritized this to give better value to their customers. Right now, I don't see myself going past the trial on this system as it doesn't do anything different then another free system I'm already using. 
  • I would LOVE to have this! I'm doing it all manually now and ignoring spending from reports/spending plans which means I can lose track of it. 
  • Joe Buck
    Joe Buck Member
    I also agree that we need a feature like this.  Just withdrawing money from the savings goal does not help me track the spending, and makes my spending plan look off. 
  • RobWilk
    RobWilk Superuser ✭✭✭✭✭
    I voted yes on this too, if i understand right, withdrawals from savings goals should affect the spending plan's "Income after bills & savings" section, and be reflected as a form of positive balance change from savings goals...   i.e. it would look like more income on that calendar month


    Rob Wilkens

  • Meghan
    Meghan Member
    edited September 2023

    Hello, 

    I would like the money withdrawn from a savings goal to be considered a positive increase or "income" in the spending plan.

    Right now, when I withdraw from a saving goal, no action happens in the spending plan.

    For example, I am saving for a car right now. I contribute money monthly to the spending plan. When I buy my car, I will have a transaction in my spending plan for my car purchase. I would then withdraw the money from my savings goal to cover my car purchase expenses. However, since withdrawals from a savings goal are not added to the spending plan, my spending plan for the month will be negative since I do not have the "income" from the savings goal to cover the expense.

    Another example, I have an Auto Fund set up in my saving goals. I keep the balance at $1000 for this goal. Anytime I have an auto expense, such as car repair or oil change, I withdraw from the savings goal to cover the expenses. As of now, there is no way to credit money into the spending plan from my savings goals. As of now, I either have to manually add another "income" to cover the expenses or ignore the transactions in the spending plan. Neither is ideal.

    I spoke to Coach Jorge about this feature. He agrees it would be a great addition.

    Thanks!

  • Flopbot
    Flopbot Superuser ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited January 2023
    @Megan,

    Thanks for the Idea Post.  Awhile back, @DannyB  did a really interesting ’Survey’ of all the forum posts related to Savings Goals.  You might find it interesting too.

    https://community.simplifimoney.com/discussion/4089/survey-of-savings-goals-enhancement-ideas-suggestions

    Regarding your specific idea, I can see what you’re talking about.  When you enter the real-world transactions, they ding your current month’s Spending Plan making it appear worse than it is.  As I understand it, this is by design and someone else would have to explain why…has something to do with not having the set aside funds negatively affect your Spending Plan twice - once when saved and once when spent.  I don’t fully get it.  However, I do know that Simplifi says we need to manually mark the ’Ignore from Spending Plan’ toggle for any transaction that is covered by a savings Goal withdrawal.

    Savings Goals still have some ways to go before they’re as automated and fully integrated as many of us would like.

    Until Simplifi improves the overall Savings Goal interface, here’s an approach that I’ve used with varying success.  I set aside money monthly in a Savings Goal for Christmas.  Then, when it comes time to spend it, I add this tag which also reminds me to mark the ’Ignore from Spending Plan’ toggle.  It’s not 100% foolproof, but it has helped me remember.




    [edited image to reduce size]

    Chris
    Quicken Desktop user since 2014.
    New to Simplifi in 2021.
  • RobWilk
    RobWilk Superuser ✭✭✭✭✭

    I've been looking for this - bump.


    Rob Wilkens

  • I just started using Simplifi and I like the Spending Plan save for this! Contributing to Savings Goals works fine in the Spending Plan, but when I pull from a Savings Goal, it needs to be reflected as income in the Spending Plan to offset the unusual spending so it doesn't look like everything is way off for the month.

  • Jerrod
    Jerrod Member

    Great idea

  • There should be a way to count Saving Goals withdrawals as inflow in the spending plan.

    I have a savings goal setup for XMas shopping, which I withdrew $2K from. I would like to track the gifts in my planned spending, but I also want my Available balance not to be $2K less than it should be. Apparently, there's no way to do this.

    The problem would be fixed if we could have Saving Goal withdrawals show up as inflow (either in income or a separate category in savings goals).

  • UrsulaA
    UrsulaA Superuser ✭✭✭✭

    From your note, I believe using the withdraw for another purpose option will get you the result you want

    You can also elect to Withdraw for another purpose, which allows you to return all or part of your contribution(s) back to your spending funds. This option is great to use for changes in circumstances, where you may need some of your Goal money back. When using this option, you'll see that the funds are removed from the saved so far amount and added back to the left to save amount of the Goal.

    https://help.simplifimoney.com/en/articles/3676756-using-quicken-simplifi-s-savings-goals

    Simplifi User Since Nov 2023

    Minter 2014-2023

    Questionable Excel before 2014 to present

  • @UrsulaA

    "When it comes to withdrawing from a Savings Goal, withdrawing to spend for the Goal will not impact the Spending Plan. However, withdrawing for another purpose will remove the funds that have been withdrawn from the Spending Plan up to the standard 'monthly contribution' amount. "

    So it sounds like you can't exceed the monthly contribution amount, which doesn't really help when you're trying to withdraw the entire goal.

    The workaround I'm using (As it looks like Simplifi has no plans to address this) is to do a transfer for the amount of money I'm withdrawing. You need to have two accounts, of course, to make this work but what you can do is:

    1. Record a transfer from one account to another for the amount you are withdrawing from your goals. You can name the payee something like 'GOAL - XMAS' or whatever your goal name is to make it easy on yourself. Make sure you withdraw it from the goals first, so you have the money available to transfer.
      1. You can also record a second transfer back into the original account for the same amount if you don't want to actually move the money at your bank.
    2. By default, Simplifi will mark both the Inflow (Green) and outflow (Gray) transactions as "Exclude from Savings Plan". What you need to do is update the inflow (Green) transaction not to exclude from the savings plan.
      1. It's important to only mark 1 transaction this way. If you do a transfer out and then back in, you will have two inflow (green) transactions.. Only mark the one inflow (green) transaction for the account where the money will stay.
    3. If you do this, your spending plan will now show inflow in "Transfers and Credit Card Payments" for the goal(s) you withdrew from.

    Piece of cake, right! 🤣

  • Thanks for this suggestion! I'll try the "record transfers" as a way to pull from a Goal's savings as a way to add income to a month where I have one-off big expenses.

    If there's an open feature request to automate withdrawing from a Goal so that it can count as "income" for purposes of a Spending Plan and paying off big, irregular bills/expenses, please let me know. I'd like to +1 it.