Credit Card with Positive Balance Confusion

ajbopp

I think there's a bug in here but I'll be darned if I know how to characterize it.

On March 10th I got a $1000 refund on a deposit I made for a new car, that I backed out of. The dealership could only issue the refund the accout the deposit came from, which was my credit card. This meant that my credit card has had a positive balance since then. In fact, it still has a positive balance of $93.76.

Every day since the 10th, the CC transaction register graph has shown a current negative balance of the amount that it's actually positive, but every day the balance changes, this history shows a positive balance correctly (or at least as correctly as it can in the upside-down world of the credit card register).

Meanwhile my planned CC payment in mid-April has been fluctuating as new transactions are coming in and I have no clear indication of what I will need to pay on April 15.

There seems to be something wonky - at least with the current balance - when the credit card balance is positive. The dot is on the wrong side of $0. There may be more to this, but it's so confusing I can't wrap my brain around it.

In addition to fixing this graph when there is a positive balance, I wonder what others' thoughts are regarding turning the credit card graph right side up and stop representing debt as a positive number and payments as a negative number. It's always been terribly confusing to understand this graph when it's all topsy-turvy.

RobWilk

I can demonstrate that it's working right for my capital one card with an account credit.. It happened because I paid the wrong card (I now have two quicksilver cards). It's showing a positive balance on the left, and the bank balance goes -below- the zero line on the cash flow chart. Yes, it's a little funny that balances on the account list are + = credit, - = amount owed, and on cash flow chart + = amount owed, - = credit. At the same time it makes sense to me in some strange way.

ajbopp

Hmm…it's never done that for me. Oh well, I always knew I was special.

RobWilk

You might be above the zero line because there is a big blue dot on 'today' which indicates (I believe) a scheduled recurring transaction due today.. Prior to today, it looks like it was below the zero line, which 'looks right'.

DannyB

Hi @ajbopp

I don't think you're seeing a bug as @RobWilk points out. It does take a shift in thinking to read cc balance projection charts since they do show your increase in debt on the up side of zero and cc credit on below the zero line. It does make sense though if you can adjust to what is being portrayed. I recentely received a couple of large refunds back to a couple of my CCs and the account on my bank's website showed the credit as a -$XXXXX whereas those accounts show charges as positives so Simplifi's graph seems to be in alignment with at least how my cc show my balances.

As far as your projected payment flucuation isn't that a function of the difference between the planned payment amount (which I have to asume, as risky as that is, that you have a set amouunt as a function of setting up your cc payment as a recurring bill. The amount you plan to pay is fixed while the amount you owe will fluctuate based on ongoing charges leading up to the end of the current billing cycle. As your charges exceed the planned amount of the payment the low point will shift upward as your screen seems to indicate.

I tested makeing CC payments as a recurring bill a year ago or so but abandoned the idea after a couple of months. I can easily see how much I owe on any given day by glancing at the account's list and I tend to pay the balance a couple of times through the month just to keep my credit usage low and to keep at bay a false sense of having lots of extra cash in our checking account 😁

Anyway, just some thoughts - I may be missing the point of your own observations.

P.S. As an individual account I'm ok with how the projection graph is portrayed. Where I'd expect to see cc charges affect cash flow negatively would be in a net worth report and if all cash flow accounts were combined into one cash flow projection graph.

ajbopp

I could understand all this if not for the fact that the blue dot has been above zero since March 10, and has been steadily decreasing toward the zero line ever since as new charges come in.

I have adjusted my mental approach to how Simplifi shows my cc balance, but it is still awkward. Positive balances are displayed one way for every account except credit accounts, which are inverted for no particularly good reason.

RobWilk

@ajbopp Think of it this way, when you spend, it's said that your credit card balance goes up — and that's the way the chart works.