Allow Split Transactions to contain negative amounts in rows

CapnWillP · December 2023

A suggestion for Split Transactions... Please allow a negative amount to be entered into a Row. On Mint, I used splits to add an amount to bring my income up to the Gross amount, then subtracted off the tax and other deductions. (Ex: Row 1: $1000 Income (the net I see) , Row2: $200 Income (to bring it up to the Gross amt, Row 3: -$200 to reflect the taxes withheld. The result is the Net Amt, but allows me to categorize the other stuff. Worked wonderfully in Mint.

RobWilk · December 2023

They recently posted that they (Quicken Simplifi) are re-designing how splits work, I don't know if there was an estimate on when, but I wouldn't be surprised if it enables this functionality because others have been asking for it as well.

mtaylor · December 2023

I think this works currently, it's just that the split row doesn't actually show the negative sign

for example, i have a split transaction where my roommate paid me back for shared expenses, and i can include $$ i owed in the splits:
+134.50
59.01 → this is the negative!

Coach Natalie · December 2023

@CapnWillP, thanks for posting!

It sounds like you need to follow the steps outlined here to split your paycheck transactions for deduction tracking (whether the amount is income or an expense depends on the Category used for that line): https://help.simplifimoney.com/en/articles/5983781-how-to-track-pre-deposit-paycheck-deductions

Let us know if this works for you!

-Coach Natalie

DeloskyGA · December 2023

Splits don't work great when you are trying to account for reimbursements from other expenses. For example, my company pays me back $75 per month for mobile phone. So I have an existing Expense of $125 to Xfinity mobile. But I also have a $75 income from my company for mobile reimbursement. But when that reimbursement is lumped in with other reimbursements, I can't select my Mobile Phone expense category in the split of the Income. The system doesn't like mixing Expense categories with Income line items. But I want to show that my Net Mobile Phone expenditure is $50 (the $125 I paid to Comcast minus the $75 I received from my company). Today, I'm not aware this is possible in Simplifi.

This is the one place Mint did a better job like other poster's mention. You could always mix Income and Expense categories in the same split. The system didn't care if an "expense" was incoming money or an "income" was outgoing based on how the user was allocating it in their budgets.

Not sure I explained it well. Just consider this a bump for re-evaluating the way Splits are done.

UrsulaA · December 2023

@DeloskyGA - the capability that will help with your need is listed in this feature request. Vote for it.

DeloskyGA · December 2023

https://community.simplifimoney.com/discussion/comment/23800#Comment_23800

Thanks. I upvoted. More important to me is the ability to split transactions with a mix of Income and Expense and not mess up the overall calculations of the transaction amount. Not sure that is clear in the requests.

Coach Natalie · December 2023

@DeloskyGA, you should be able to have a mix of income and expense amounts in split transactions currently. You'd ultimately want the amount of the transaction to match the real-life amount regardless of what Categories/Tags/Amounts it's split into.

Screenshot 2023-12-29 at 12.43.31 PM.png

If you have a suggestion for a change to this, you can create an Idea post to outline and request it:

https://community.simplifimoney.com/discussion/998/creating-and-voting-for-ideas-in-the-community

I hope this helps!

-Coach Natalie

UrsulaA · December 2023

@Coach Natalie - thanks for the tip on mixing income and expense categories on splits. Tha is helpful.

DeloskyGA · January 1

Ok. I thought that was the case @Coach Natalie but I still can't do the original ask. I have a reimbursement (Income) of $95.35 from my company. $75 is for my Mobile Phone and $10.35 is for Tolls. But when I go to split this transaction, the issue I was explaining above happens. When I put $75 Mobile Phone in the first line (an Expense), it forces $170.35 into the line below it.

Then, when I modify the second line to the $10.35 Expense for tolls, then the first line item is automatically increased to $105.70 (which looks like the system adds $10.35 + $10.35 to the first line). And I can't enter Negative numbers anywhere here.

Ultimately, I cannot Split an Income into multiple Expense categories. I want to be able to do this to show that my monthly Mobile Phone bill was it's original amount minus this reimbursement. And that my Tolls expenses are a net of $0 because of this reimbursement as well.

With Simplifi, how am I supposed to accomplish this?

UrsulaA · January 2

Are you missing items on your question? "$95.35 from my company. $75 is for my Mobile Phone and $10.35 is for Tolls."

$75 + $10.35 = $85.35, not $95.35

The total amount of the splits needs to add up to $95. Also, the tolls needs a + sign too, if it is a reimbursement. Otherwise you get the issue above, which is Simplifi trying to match up the real life total with the split sum.

As @Coach Natalie said, the sum of the splits needs to equal $95.35, the money you received.

DeloskyGA · January 3

Ack! Sorry for the confusion. You are correct in your math @UrsulaA and what you are saying is exactly what I was entering. Sorry about that.

It is the forcing of the + sign in the amount field that I was missing and looks like what was causing the issue. As soon as I put the + in front of the $75 Mobile Phone expense field, the next field forced a +$20.35 in the next row and everything looks to be adding up correctly.

I think I understand the splitting functionality better now and can split my paycheck deductions out like I need to and split transactions across Expense and Income as well. Just need to get that "splitting creates separate transactions" feature implemented. ;)

Thanks.

CapnWillP · January 19

I recently realized that I was expecting an expense on a split transaction row to be negative. However, while it shows as a positive amount it DOES subtract from the overall balance. That solves my problem, but if I ever want to offset an expense (like for a refund or reimbursement) in a split transaction I won’t be able to. No big deal right now but it might come up.

EL1234 · January 19

https://community.simplifimoney.com/discussion/comment/26517#Comment_26517

If you want to offset an expense (for a reimbursement, as you mentioned) you can put a plus sign before the number and it'll treat it as a negative. It's counterintuitive and I discovered it by mistake - but since it normally treats an expense as subtracting money from your account, putting the plus sign will tell it to add the money to your account instead.

UrsulaA · January 19

https://community.simplifimoney.com/discussion/comment/26517#Comment_26517

I have offset an expense in a split transaction. My daughter paid me back for something using her allowance.

Split I used

Allowance (expense) $15 - entered with no sign, allowance is an expense category

Kids Subscription +$14 - added a plus sign as Kids Subscription is an expense category

Result - $1 down total, which was the amount I gave my kid back.

SRC54 · January 19

I've never had any problem with negative numbers such as when I trade something in for something else and I need to credit one category and debit another. I've done this routinely. It may throw you off that income categories are automatically + and expense categories are automatically - so you sometimes have Simplifi changing it, but you can override it.

Allow Split Transactions to contain negative amounts in rows

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