Get your budget under control with MoneyTracker
Sticking to your budget is simple with the MoneyTracker personal finance tool.
Do you struggle to curb impulsive spending? There’s no shame in admitting that sometimes you buy things you want rather than need. We all do it. It makes us feel better – for a short while. Then we have to deal with the consequences.
If this sounds familiar and you want to mend your ways, then the free MoneyTracker from Nedbank is just the tool you’ve been waiting for. With a little effort, you can start tracking your spending, so that you can understand where your money is going and where you can cut back.
Your go-to budgeting app
MoneyTracker’s user-friendly design means you don’t need to know anything about budgeting or accounting to get started. Once you’ve linked your accounts, you can then import transactions and allocate them to the category for which you want to set a spending limit, for example ‘entertainment’.
After that, all you need to do is track your monthly spending to see how well you’re managing to stick to your budget in that category. Don’t worry about having to deal with spreadsheets filled with numbers; MoneyTracker uses intuitive design and graphics so that you can easily and immediately see how you’re doing.
One of the most useful features is that you can set MoneyTracker to allocate expenses to budget items automatically. As time goes by, it will become better at recognising transactions and allocating them to the correct budget categories. It will even send you notifications to warn you if you’re getting close to your preset budget limit for the month.
Apart from managing your personal budget, you can set up and track income and expenses from a side hustle or alternative forms of income
And if you want to track your spending in greater detail, you can do so by creating up to 8 dashboards that can each track specific expenses. For example, you can create one that tracks just your groceries and essentials to make sure you don’t overspend whenever you’re at the shops.
Or you can track how much your passions like sport, art or entertainment cost you every month.
Why budgeting is important
Creating and sticking to a monthly budget has both financial and psychological benefits. The better you’re able to manage your money, the more secure and settled you’ll feel. Whether you use MoneyTracker or a different way to set and monitor your expenses, you’ll be doing yourself a world of good.
Firstly, having a budget puts you firmly in charge of your finances. Only you can decide what you should be spending on and what you want to be spending on. Once you have a plan, you’ll then become more aware of what things cost and how much you’re spending. If your goal is to cut your expenses, just being aware of where your money goes will help to keep your spending in check.
By using MoneyTracker to manage all your monthly expenses and track your spend, you’ll start to pick up problem areas where you may be overspending or under-budgeting. We all want to spend as little as possible on transport, but when petrol prices go up, we simply have to adjust. So, make sure your budget is realistic and revisited often, so that your assumptions remain accurate.
Most importantly, the budgeting process helps you to build better money habits. You’ll become less reliant on debt, and you’ll improve how you manage and use credit.
Side hustle saviour
A really great MoneyTracker feature is that you have a mini accounting app in your hands. Apart from managing your personal budget, you can set up and track income and expenses from a side hustle or alternative forms of income, like renting out a room or cottage.
Not only can you use one of the dashboards to name and track all these transactions, but you’re also able to generate and track invoices to ensure you get paid, just like you would with a top-end accounting package.
Separating your business and personal finances makes sense on so many levels and lowers the risk of your personal affairs suffering if your business takes a dive.
How to get MoneyTracker
You can access MoneyTracker on the Nedbank Money app or Online Banking.
On the Money app, log in and tap ‘More’ in the bottom navigation pane. Select ‘MoneyTracker’, and then create a personal, business or side-hustle dashboard. Select the accounts you would like to track. Give your dashboard a name and start categorising your spend to set up a budget.
If you want to use Online Banking, log in and click on ‘MoneyTracker’ in the top navigation menu. Follow the same set-up steps and start getting smart with your money.
