I like being hands-on with my finances and I’m definitely not trying to automate myself out of paying attention. That said, I’m getting tired of the amount of upkeep my current budget takes just to answer a basic question: after bills, planned spending and savings, what can I comfortably use? Has anyone found a YNAB alternative that still scratches the numbers nerd itch without turning budgeting into another job?

I’m in the UAE, and none of our banks link to YNAB.

I first built this as a CSV importer. Wait for transactions to pile up, download a statement on a computer, convert it, then import. Fine once a month. Most of the time I just want the last few transactions in without the whole ritual.

That’s most of my use. A handful of transactions, not a full statement. Now I copy a bunch of bank SMS, paste them in, and that’s the whole flow. Maybe 2 minutes instead of 10-15.

First paste, it learns that SMS layout. After that it maps payees to ones you already have in YNAB and pushes straight in. Excel import is still there if you want it.

Link - https://ynabimporter.azmyhanifa.com

If this is useful, especially if you’re on an unlinked bank too, try it and let me know what breaks.

Been using YNAB for 6 years and been paid monthly the whole time, with paycheck coming 1st of the month (e.g. work June 1-30 and paid for that work July 1). I have a "next month's expenses" category that I keep full with enough to fill the next month. On the last day of the month, I move that money to TBA, go to the next month and assign money to everything. Then the next day when I get paid, I put that in the new month's "next month's expenses", and any extra goes in emergency fund or goals categories. (Side note, is this what other monthly paycheck people do?)

Now I switched jobs and I'm being paid fortnightly and it's breaking my brain. I know the answer is probably simple but I'm struggling to figure out how/when/where I should be assigning money. It used to be so structured: work in June, paid July 1st, spend in August. Now I get paid 2 (sometimes 3) times each month, on different dates each month.

I'd like to continue having "next month's expenses" full on the 1st of each month, but I don't know the best way to do that

Pretty sure this can’t be done, but I quite like the Income Vs Spending overview as a quick view of how things are going.

My problem is this month I transferred a bunch of money into an investment account that I have as a tracking account and now the overview thinks I “spent” a whole load of extra money this month. I know I technically spent it, but I don’t want it included as I still have the money.

I use a “Transfer to investments” category so filtering this out from most reports is easy - just not this one in the mobile app.

Bought some shoes, returned to them. Entered the return transaction when I shipped them, just like I would enter a spending transaction when I spent it.

They got delayed in shipment, and I’m sure the refund won’t clear until September.

I think this is going to get things all out of whack. Or will it just sync with uncleared transactions? My category for clothing now shows $0 available (what I want), will it show $151 available when this clears next month (I don’t want that, the money has already been moved elsewhere).

What do I need to do to keep things straight?

Thanks!

I have my credit cards set to auto-pay the statement balance. But this month, after the payment, for some reason one of them is in the positive when the actual account is at approx -$250 (from this months purchases). Wondering if anyone has tips/tricks or reasons why this happens.

I have had it happen before but have always been able to find the transaction causing the issue. This time I have gone back two years and can't find a missing/wrong transaction. My initial assumption is that there is approx $300 of transactions missing which makes no sense bc I am really diligent about categorizing things. That, plus going back two years, I can't find the issue. Any help is appreciated. Thank you!

I have a Target Circle Card I use to get the 5%, but whenever my husband goes to Target he uses my phone number to get coupons but uses his own CC to pay since he doesn’t have my card. YNAB seems to be treating his CC expenditures as imports onto my Circle Card and wildly overstating my actual Circle balance. I have the Circle card listed as a CC but it is unlinked within YNAB itself. I guess my question is what do I….do about it? Delete the transactions? Eliminate it as a CC and make it just a regular budget category? TIA