Rollover unused Spending Plan money [edited] (10 Merged Votes)

Then what happens to that $100 you didn't spend in the first month? It doesn't just vanish.

Spending everything in the groceries budget doesn't mean I didn't save anything. That's what monthly contributions to savings goals are for. I don't need whatever little extra from groceries to go towards that as well. I'd rather be able to simply keep it allocated for groceries so I don't have to artificially force all of my spending to fit neatly into one month chunks. Just because the previous month ended on Wednesday and I didn't get groceries until Saturday doesn't mean I should lose $250 worth of groceries and force my family to starve this month to not go over the budget.

Hi Natalie, am an early access user but can’t see the feature yet to try it. Hopefully, it will turn on in my account very soon.

Hi - I have early access turned on (for a while already) but don't yet see the Rollover option. Is there an ETA when all the early access users will have it enabled? (I'm trying to be patient, don't worry :) )

Thanks!

Hopefully, the feature will be released before end of month so we can experience how it works. I have early access turned on, but still waiting for the update to arrive.

You're right about the arbitrary time aspect. What is a month for anyway? Does our budgeting period need to be (roughly) aligned with the duration of a moon's phases? Not really.

But, at the same time it's an easy reference for people. It's easy to think about spending $1000 a month on groceries a month, than it is to think about a daily ($33) or yearly ($12,000) version of that spend, or indeed no duration and just allocating some amount that comes in via income. I think the monthly amounts give people time to adjust their spending within a timeframe that's actionable, which I think helps people meet their spending goals. I know it helps me, at least.

As you say, it's personal. I think the implementation allows for flexibility to meet most people's needs.

The "release funds available for spending" is not exactly solving the specific use case. I agree with the folks who are saying its okay but it's not great. The problem is that the minute you release something and make it available for spending elsewhere, then it does not remain tied to the category that you had assigned it to. These are two completely different use cases.

1. If you thought you needed $50 for gifts this month and you ended up not needing it, in that case it is a good thing that you can release the money and spend it on something else. For this situation, the feature is working well.
2. BUT… When it comes to regular expenses that are frequent but inconsistent - such as putting gas in my car - I fill it up when it is empty, so this falls on different days of the month and sometimes more in one month than another, but you still want to be able to roughyl estimate how much you spend in a month on average. If your gas budget is $100 per month and this month you spend $80 then you should be able to conserve the remaining $20 and keep it within the gas budget category and roll it over so that next month you now have $120 since you probably will need to fill up twice given that you underspent in the previous month. Mint had this down perfectly, I cant understand why you guys struggle with it.
3. Final use case relates to certain expenses that dont come up every month, but which you would like to be able to budget for so you don't have to feel the burn in one single month when the expense is due (think of it like saving up for something). As an example - I pay my car insurance for the year upfront because it is cheaper that way. This expense is due every March but it is a big one, like $1000. I can't afford to gauge $1000 out of my March budget because it will skew everything else. What I need to do is be able to stash away $83 per month from each of my budgets leading up to March, and then when that expenses occurs and I assign it to the car insurance category, then the system whoudl be smart enough to know that I didn't spend $1000 in March, it was acutally $83 that I spent from this month, and the rest of it had been saved up all year to get to that point. Again, Mint had this use case totally dialled in and I don't know why you can't so it too. This is literally the definition of "budgeting".

I have access to it now. However, this is a feature I will not use. IF I overspend a month, it is fine but would like my spending limits to be the same month to month. I am glad it was not turned on by default.

I would be happier to have the ability to move any unused budget funds, from any category, to the total balance (or to an overspent budget item) for the current month, so I have a better idea of my overall success for any given month.

I think it would be most effective to allow the rollover amounts to affect the “planned spending” and “available” amounts in the spending plan. Otherwise. Rollovers are hard to account for. At least give the option to include rollover amounts in spending plans and reports.

the rollover amounts do not currently affect the dollar amounts available or the planned spending amount. For example if you have a negative rollover amount of $100 in the grocery category. It will not reduce your overall spending plan or the amount available that month. Makes it hard to account for the overall amounts. At least we need to have the option.