How do you keep track of your finances?

Lazy_Runner

With Personal accounts 5 you can use it for home or business purposes. You just set it up slightly differently in each case.

It is a double entry system. So I say that have £xx going from my salary to my current account.
The system puts a figure of £-xx in the salary file and a figure of £xx in my current account file.

If I say I am paying my mortgage then I say a figure of £yy is going from my current account to my mortgate account.
£-yy is subtracted from my current account and is added to my mortgage account.

System then keeps a running total of each file/account.

I can also run reports on the entries in each file within date parameters. So I can find out how much I spend on eating out from June to August say (because I have recorded those details).

Anyways, I like the product, I don't work for the company nor am I on commission. Shame really.

Good luck with whatever you choose to do.

Regards

LR

Paul_Herring

Lazy_Runner wrote:

With Personal accounts 5 you can use it for home or business purposes. You just set it up slightly differently in each case.

It is a double entry system. So I say that have £xx going from my salary to my current account.
The system puts a figure of £-xx in the salary file and a figure of £xx in my current account file.

MSMoney works in exactly the same way.

annie12

Thanks to eveyone who replied, much appreciated.
I'm getting to grips with MS money....slowly!! A question I have is - what do you do when you've written a cheque, do you enter it in on the day you write it? I'm feeling really thick atm

MPH80

It's up to you. I do that and it helps me see what's due to come out.

I enter it on the day I write it - but set a date on it in the future (e.g. 5 days ahead - allowing for cashing times) and then when I see it crop up on the online banking - I adjust the date and mark it as reconciled.

M.

annie12

Do you do that by clicking on 'balance this account?' :huh:

Cypher

yes you reconcile the account using the "balance this account"


It then asks you for some details. Final balance off your statement, any interest payment or bank charges etc click next (I think)

then it gives you a listing off all unreconciled transactions for that account. You simply tick the ones matching your statement to reconcile the account. and you can edit the transactions to correct any errors or add new entries if you find something missing.

MPH80

Alternative - you can do the way I do it - which is that as each transaction appears, I right click on the transaction and select "Mark-As" and then "Reconciled".

However, by doing this on individual transactions means that the balance your account function mentioned by Cypher becomes unusable - and so it can be harder to find mistakes if you don't track your balance every day.

M.

annie12

Thanks to everyone for all their help, I've go to grips with my personal finances now!
I still need help setting up my husbands business accounts though, I'm a bit confused! Does anyone do thier business accounts on MS money?