Share your feedback regarding the new 'Transfers' bucket in the Spending Plan here!

Coach Natalie

With the addition of the new 'Transfers' bucket in the Spending Plan, we'd love to hear everyone's feedback! Please comment below letting us know how this addition has helped you with budgeting, tracking Transfers as expenses, or any other improvements this change has made for you. Let us know if you have any suggestions for improvement, as well!

For more details on the new 'Transfers' bucket, please see our Product Update post here!

Flopbot

I haven't used the new module enough to have made up my mind, but the one thing that I see - or in this case don't see - right away is that the text is VERY hard to see when things are ignored on the Web App. Grey on grey is super difficult to read. Even if something is ignored, I still want to be able to read the text. A grey background with black text might be a better option.

ajbopp

gray on white in the mobile app isn't any better!

[edited image to reduce size]

bbertchie

this is great, however, I believe the signs are backwards on the amounts in my instance. I am taking money from my checking account and putting it into my savings. The amount on my checking side should be negative, not positive and on the savings side, should be positive, not negative.

ajbopp

This is hard for even me to believe, but somehow the app magically changed one of my transfers completely.

The following screenshots show a recurring transfer that was $300 from my Checking account to my Savings account to occur on the 15th of every month. Now it's $1000 from Savings to my credit card. Two days ago I had created a one-time transfer of $1000 from Savings to Platinum that was to occur on June 2, and I've only now looked at the new Transfers bucket closely. I am absolutely positive it was not like this before the Transfers bucket appeared because I checked it several times against my spending plan and my cash flow chart.

I see this on every platform, browser and app that I have access to. It would appear that the database was somehow modified with this update. It won't be a big pain for me to correct it, but I wanted to let you know.

DannyB

On the road this month and haven't had time to check it out. One thing I noticed in the brief moment I checked into Simplifi I noticed and income event was.missing for June. But then I found it in the new Transfer bucket.

Second thought was, "I'm going to need some education on the new addition

rmeav8er

Right now I hate it. It's taken the recurring bill from my recurring stock purchase and made it so I can't see it in the spending plan anymore. Even though it is recurring, it disappeared in 3 of the last 5 months and doesn't show up on any reports. Already submitted a ticket for it. It's also added multiple extra "transactions" under the other spending and none of it adds up to the correct amount. I'm not sure what I have left to spend.

jsy42

I like it, but the spending plan total for recurring transfers is $0 in future months. The recurring transfers are present, but not calculated in the total.

ajbopp

@jsy42 It probably is actually 0. A transfer is moving an amount of money from one account to another account - a positive side of the transfer and a negative side. Totaled, they would come out to zero.

jsy42

@ajbopp - Thanks, that's a good point, but to clarify, I have the recurring transfers configured with the 'Money Out' side of the transactions included in reports and spending plan, and the 'Money In' side excluded. Therefore, the money out should be included in the total. The behavior is different for the current month vs future months. Doesn't seem like intentional functionality.

doriansl23

I love this new feature. Thank you.

TxQuickenConvert

I also can barely see the transfers due to the choice of colors (marked to not show up in spending plan or reports). Would be better if there was just an icon that indicated that status and the text remained readable.

SRC54

Like everyone else, I haven't used it much and as usual I try to find out if a new feature is useful to me. It can help to find entry errors of course. I think it's kind of neat.

One thing I notice is in my wife's paycheck with all the deductions and transfers to retirement, I have to include it in Spending Plan and Reports. I experimented with marking the other side of the transfer to Retirement as Excluded from both, and it increased our monthly spending by the amount transferred to Retirement. So if you think that a retirement contribution is spending, you can do that. I think of it as Savings so I will leave both sides included. I applaud anything that gives people options according to their needs/desires.

However, in one year, when my wife retires, this state retirement asset will be wiped out replaced by a guaranteed monthly check for life and I will have to zero out the "asset". So I guess it really doesn't matter that I have it as savings. Ultimately, it will be in effect more like a state tax so it is spending. With IRAs, you withdraw from the asset, so they definitely are savings.

SRC54

I noticed that by default that transfers are kept at 0.00, but of course I had to experiment with showing the actual amount, which only changes if you exclude one side but not the other of a transfer OR if like me, you have some transfers that aren't linked to but one account.

In my case, that is my Possessions Account where I list the durable goods we own. Presently, I buy something, say a TV set for $500 and I record the purchase as Home:Durable Goods. That's an expense. Then I put an entry into Possessions as a Transfer for $500. By default the transfer is ignored.

But if I include the items in Spending Plan AND have the Transfer Bucket show actual calculated amount, it will show a +$500 for the month. So in effect, that spending is negated.

When I go back next year and change the asset price in Possessions to a depreciated $350, the Spending Plan for the month last year when I bought it will show an increase of $150 in spending, which is effectively correct. When I zero, it down, I will ultimately have spent $500 with no offset asset. Kind of neat.

I will try it for a while that way!

sygyzy

https://community.simplifimoney.com/discussion/comment/15718#Comment_15718

Seeing the same behavior. I have a bi-monthly transfer from Checkings to Savings and it shows a negative applied to the savings and a positive to the checkings.

ajbopp

@bbertchie @sygyzy I thought the same thing at first too, but then I realized I was looking at it backwards. The flow of money is represented here exactly the same as in the Bills and Subscriptions sections of the Spending Plan.

That is:

1. Date of Transaction
2. Name of Transction
3. Status of Transaction
4. Category of Transaction
5. Recurring or not
6. Hidden or not
7. Amount of Transaction.

In the case of a transfer, what you're thinking is the Account field is actually the Category field. The Account field is never actually shown in the Spending Plan tables. So if I'm seeing a transfer of $300 from Checking to Savings, the way to read the line item is:

"On the 5th of the month, I am making my 'Monthly savings transfer' <or whatever name I gave it> to Savings Account <the category> in the amount of -$300." And this is a negative number because the Account field (Checking) is not displayed, only implied.

And then immediately below:

"On the 5th of the month, I am making my 'Monthly savings transfer' from Checking Account in the amount of +$300." And this is a positive number because the account field (Savings) is not displayed, only implied.

In the same way, in the Bills section, a particular line would be read as:

"On the 9th of the month, I am making my 'Alliant Engergy' <the name I gave this bill> payment to Utilities/Electric <the category> in the amount of -$164.95." This is a negative number because the account that payment is coming from is not displayed, and it's straightforward to understand that I'm not getting money from my electric bill so the sign in front of the amount looks correct.

It's confusing, and if I were to suggest a fix, it would be to go ahead and include the account name in these Spending Plan tables so that it's more clear where the money is coming from. However, the current display is consistent with the rest of the Spending Plan.

RobWilk

I just "really" started using the Transfers bucket, to set up future spending plan months, specifically months where I am using a savings goal (or a recurring savings transfer for same) to pay for a savings-goal-funded-expense (for me, "rollover"). Worked amazingly, I went out 12 months and now I have no months with a negative amount remaining. It took me like 2 minutes or less to get comfortable with how to use it, now I love it. THANK YOU SIMPLIFI - And I know I was among the first people i'm aware of to request the ability to ignore one side of a transfer, this is perfect.

MrGood

It appears that the new feature to hide only one side of a linked transfer may not have been fully implemented. I itemize my paychecks and some of the underlying splits are linked transfers. Simplifi has this behavior that transactions containing split linked transfers are AUTOMATICALLY set as Exclude from Reports and Exclude from Spending Plan upon saving.

Since I need the paycheck to be reflected in reports and spending plan, I would simply re-open the split "paycheck" transaction and un-check both exclude checkboxes. This would also automatically clear the "exclude" flags on the resulting linked transfer transactions.

However, with the one-side-ignore-transfer feature now, Simplifi does NOT do the automatic clearing of exclude on the other side of the linked transfers. Attempting to clear the Exclude boxes on those linked transactions directly gives the error that Excludes can only be modified from the originating transaction. Herein lies the issue — the originating transaction doesn't update the linked transfer Excludes anymore as a result of the new feature below.

The attached PDF showcases this detail.

At this point, I am now stuck with my Spending Plan and reports being skewed as a result of the linked transfers that I cannot UNHIDE.

Simplifi Issue.pdf

https://community.simplifimoney.com/discussion/3897/ability-to-mark-just-one-side-of-a-transfer-to-ignore-from-spending-plan-edited

MrGood

WORKAROUND

Attempting to clear the Exclude checkboxes on linked transfers resulting from the split transactions from the Transaction register is futile. The error directs you to clear the flags on the source transaction, which does nothing to update the linked transfer transactions.

HOWEVER, clearing the Exclude flags on the linked transfer transactions via the new Transfers area in the Spending Plan does work.

Coach Natalie

Hello @MrGood,

Thanks for sharing, and I'm glad you got it figured out by using the new Transfers bucket in the Spending Plan!

I went ahead and merged your post with our existing feedback post for the new Transfers bucket so your experience regarding the changes with 'Transfers' can be reviewed by our Product Team. 🙂

-Coach Natalie

MrGood

Thanks @Coach Natalie . I do think the behavior is inconsistent. For the "linked transactions", I can only unhide from the Spending Plan Transfers bucket via the "3-dot-menu" on each linked transfer and unselecting the Visibility checkmarks. However, if I try that same operation from the Transaction Detail modal, I get an error. IMHO, either the operation is allowed or not allowed throughout the application.

With this new version, seems like the "error checking" validation on the Transaction Detail needs to be removed as it is no longer relevant as it was when both sides of linked transfers had to reflect the same Visibility.

cfields

I'm not sure where we ended up with the question from jsy42 on 2-June:

" I have the recurring transfers configured with the 'Money Out' side of the transactions included in reports and spending plan, and the 'Money In' side excluded. Therefore, the money out should be included in the total"

I find that for my re-occurring transfers with 'Money In' excluded and 'Money Out' side included, the net transfer for future months is still $0. I would expect to see the negative side of the transaction in transfers in the spending plan.

RobWilk

Did you make sure to select "Use Calculated Transfers"

Then Unhide only one side of said transactions:

Just be aware, I think the account names are backwards…..

For the example above, it might say CHASE SAVINGS next to +$200 — But it's a +$200 to checking on that line. [removed - accuracy], so everything seems to be opposite

cfields

Thanks @RobWilk, it turns out that after stopping and re-starting the app I got the expected behavior.

UrsulaA

I enjoy using this feature as I can see when the credit card payments went it or my contributions to savings and brokerage accounts (transfers from checking).

Ed Rizzolo

I am new to Simplifi and have found the way it works to be very intuitive EXCEPT for this feature. It is very counter intuitive how the Spending Plan shows the 2 sides of the transfer in a way that makes it extremely difficult to tell what account is doing the sending and what account is doing the receiving. See example below that a Simplifi coach sent me:

To me, the way it is displayed makes it look like the Visa account sent money and went down by -$3.40, and the Checking account Received money and went up by +$3.40. This is the exact opposite of what really happened. The checking account sent the money and went down by -$3.40, and the Visa account received money and was credited the +$3.40. It was pointed out to me that the way Simplifi shows the category here is consistent with how categories are shown throughout the product, but since this section only involves accounts (a special type of category) it really should be treated differently. I would suggest that is shows the From Account on one line (in this example checking), and the To Account on the second line (in this example the Visa), rather than the category. I will submit an idea for change so please go out and vote!

RobWilk

I agree with @Ed Rizzolo and this always 'seemed backwards' to me. I don't remember if there was an idea post to change that or not, but i remember when this transfer bucket feature was released this was something I was not happy with right away. At this point, I'm used to it, but would still prefer something more intuitive.

EL1234

https://community.simplifimoney.com/discussion/comment/15765#Comment_15765

I just found this thread now, and what you wrote up here sounds like it might be helpful to me (as an avid voter for Rollover) but I don't fully understand. Would you be able to explain a this approach with a little more detail? Thanks!

RobWilk

This was 7-8 months ago….

But essentially, let's say I had a $2000 expense in 12 months, I would set up a savings goal, and each month put whatever portion of that was necessary to reach the $2000 on time (it's 6am, i'm not doing math right now, but savings goals can do the math for you if you set a date). Each savings goal contribution amount is already held aside from each month's spending plan. The money I had put to the savings goals was actually transferred to a savings account (Fortunately, recent rule changes for my bank due to covid allow more than 6 savings withdrawals a month now). When the $2000 was reached, and I wanted to use the $2000, I would schedule a transfer from savings to checking, and in simplifi's transfer bucket I would HIDE the money out (negative) but UNHIDE the money in (positive) and this would give me a credit for that month's spending plan of $2000 (the money I 'rolled over' is now available in that month's spending plan).

IT worked for me, for a while, but now I only have one $2000-ish rolled over goal ("vacation expenses")— my smaller goals I found another way to (usually) fit into my monthly budget…

EL1234

Got it! So basically you were able to use Transfers to treat the withdrawal from savings as extra income to help towards the spending plan on the months that you had saved up for. That's neat! Thanks for explaining it.

Coach Natalie

We appreciate everyone's feedback on the Transfers bucket in the Spending Plan!

-Coach Natalie