We try to pack in a large variety of features and flexibility yet still make it easy to use and give you the ability to manage several aspects of your finances. Because we have so many features, some may not be easily noticeable on the site so we’ve compiled a list of options on the site that may not be as noticeable as we’d like:

  1. Gas Mileage – The Gas Mileage application can be found either under Organize from the Simple navigation menu or Finance from the Advanced navigation menu. When entering a new transaction a gallons input box will appear if you’ve selected a category that is tied to your gas mileage application. At the top of the Gas Mileage page you’ll see where you can set your default gas mileage settings.
  2. Pay Down Schedule – From the My Bills page when you enter a new bill, you’ll see a link titled “more options…” and then an input box titled “Total Due”. If you enter a total due amount, a small calculator icon will appear next to your bill on the monthly forecast link. Clicking this will show you all the future dates, amounts, and how much will be left until the balance reaches a positive amount. If you create a transfer to a loan or credit card, this will automatically show up based on the total loan amount or total credit balance due.
  3. Quick Notes – When you click on Notes under Organization in the navigation menu, you’ll be taken to the search application that shows notes, links, or transactions. Notice once clicked, the search box will be pre-filled with “n:”. If you add text after “n:” such as “n:This is a new note”, a note will automatically be created for you instead of having to click the New Note link. You can see the full list of Quick Search Results by click the “Quick Search Terms” link.
  4. Budget Income – When selecting Income/Deposit as your Budget Type, note that deposits entered will reduce the budget amount remaining instead of increasing the amount as expense budget categories work. Therefore if you enter a withdrawal tied to a deposit budget category, the amount available in your Budget will be increased by the withdrawal amount. Also note that if you’ve created a transfer transaction and both the deposit and withdrawal transactions are tied to the same category, the budget amount will not be effected since the 2 transactions will add up to 0. To overcome this, only enter in your budget category for the withdrawal transaction so that your Budget will appear correctly. If you would also like to categorize your deposit, you can create a deposit type category for the deposits in your transfers.
  5. Simple vs. Advanced Navigation – As the site grew over time, the original navigation menu became quite large so we decided to start users off with a Simple Navigation which does not include all the available applications. Once you feel comfortable with how the site works and have a good grasp on the main applications to setup such as Bills, Income, Transactions, Budget, Accounts, etc., try to switch to the Advanced Navigation from the drop-down at the top of the Navigation menu to explore more things you can do on the site.
  6. Beta Applications – We are now up to 58 beta applications on the list and increasing everyday. If you ever thought, “I wish I had an easy way to track…”, you can most likely find it here. From the top of the page, type in what you’re looking for in the Search Applications textbox. If no results come up, click the “Create Application” link. From this page you can either create the application yourself or just enter in a description of what you want the application to keep track of and we’ll create it for you.
  7. Side Bars – All the modules you see on the left and right side of each page can be moved or removed by clicking the link “Side Bars” at the top right corner of each page. Once clicked, you’ll see a list of all available modules.  By moving up and down the order, you can adjust where each module gets shown and on which side it shows up on.
  8. Tagging your Transactions – If you click the “Settings” link in the upper right corner of each page, you’ll see an option to allow Tagging. If you’re not familiar with “tags”, it basically gives you the ability to assign multiple categories to a single entry. Once saved, you’ll see a tag input box from the New Transaction Toolbox. Once a transaction has been tagged it will show up on the My Transaction page and will also be searchable from the My Search page found under the Organize section on the Navigation menu or entering a search term from the My Transactions page.
  9. RSS Feeds – You have the ability to view your upcoming Bills, Reminders, Contacts, or Shopping List in your reader of choice by going to the RSS Feeds page. From the simple menu choose Other > Tools to access the RSS Feeds page and from the Advanced menu choose Information > Tools. Also notice other features you can make use of on the Tools page to make it easier to manage your finances.
  10. Attaching Receipts to your Transactions – At the bottom of the My Transactions page, you’ll see a link to File Uploads which will allow you to upload receipts, images, and other documents. Once uploaded, you can easily go back and view or print out a receipt that you’ve entered in the past. This is especially useful for large purchases that you may need to return in the future.
  11. I Owe You Notifications – When you create a new I Owe You and enter in the email of the person that you owe or that owes you, if the other person is also a BudgetTracker user, they will receive a notification with a link the will add the same amount*-1 to their list of I Owe You’s.
  12. Ideas and Innovations – As you use the site more and more, you’ll most likely come up with ideas of things you wish you could do or change on the site. For this, we recommend entering a post in the Ideas and Innovations section of the Message Board. If you view the past ideas entered, you’ll see that the majority of ideas or recommendations have gotten implemented so you have a feeling of knowing that you contributed something to making the site what it is today.
  13. Automatic Income Transfers – The My Income page gives you similar options as the My Bills page but also gives you the ability to automatically transfer a portion of the funds to separate accounts or split the deposit into separate accounts. The difference is that one will first deposit the entire amount into the main account first, then transfer from the main account to other accounts. The second option converts the original transaction into separate deposit transactions from the beginning. To turn this feature on, you’ll see a checkbox titled “Auto Record Transfer/Split”.
  14. Quick Links – This is only found on the Advanced Navigation menu which you can access by selecting the drop-down at the top of the Navigation menu. From this drop-down you can add any page you are currently viewing as a quick bookmark section for the BudgetTracker site. In addition however, you can also add your own links to other sites by clicking “Customize…”. This includes uploaded files if you are on the File Subscription plan.
  15. Quick Transactions – From the Tools page as noted above, you’ll see a link to the Quick Transactions page. This give you a quick way to enter in new transactions yet remain browsing the Internet. Once entered, the transactions will appear in a pending transactions list. If using this feature, make sure you check the Go To… drop-down to determine if any transactions are still pending for you to confirm and accept.