Love the thoughts!
Simplicity is king I think. I am going to ponder your idea for longer Chris. It
may be that there is a better way to structure budgeting in gnc, or as Adrian
says maybe a new user interface is the better way to go.
One thing on my todo list is to look into how I can attach a text field to each
budget entry, and each account (to explain how the number was defined. Eg in my
monthly budget I might want to attach a comment to the "Dining out" account
that says "$50 per weekend, plus $100 each Wed for taking the wife to dinner"
(if only I had the cash for that!!!!)). So, I may be looking more into budget
account structures soon and thus be better placed to see the more flexible way
forward...
Thanks and regards,
Matt
-------- Original message --------
From: Adrien Monteleone <adrien.montele...@gmail.com>
Date: 1/2/18 03:36 (GMT+10:00)
To: gnucash-de...@lists.gnucash.org
Subject: Re: Future allocated money, aka Envelope Budgeting
> On Jan 31, 2018, at 10:09 AM, Christopher Lam <christopher....@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> Hi Matt- I thought this should move to the devel list, because of technical
> details, and this discussion will be very speculative.
>
> I had a thought about how envelope budgeting could work: "divide your
> paycheck into separate envelopes for different purposes".
>
> A solution: *Create another type of transaction.*
>
> There's already u(n)reconciled, (c)leared, (y)reconciled, (v)oid
> transactions. And (f)rozen I believe is unused. Let's create a new type -
> (b)udget. But the balances are handled differently.
>
> It would require some UI and calculations changes --
>
> 1. The account budget balance is always maintained similarly to
> Running/Reconciled/Cleared Balances. But it would count all previous
> split-values *and* the (b)udget split amounts. However the budget running
> balance is not shown in the default register. This means, existing
> balances/register are unchanged.
Having transactions in an account register that don’t affect the balance is
going to be very problematic. I think this would really confuse users.
I would think budget levels for each expense account could be exposed in the
properties/preferences for each one.
The allocation of budget money would have to be handled with a special dialog
on demand, or as part of an income/asset account preferences with
percentages/formulas. (essentially a template transaction that fires when
entries are made in that account)
We already have a budgeting mechanism to set how much we *want* to spend on a
particular expense.
What we’re discussing here is a way to ‘save up’ funds received for each of
those expenses.
If I understand correctly, the budget module uses hidden accounts to keep track
of everything. I would think these same accounts, or other hidden accounts
paired with them, could do the job.
The question is just how to design the user interface of allocating assets to
those hidden accounts.
>
> Let's say we're in a bank account register
>
> 1/1 Opening $10000 Running Balance=$10000, Cleared/Reconciled Balance=
> $0, Budget=$10000
> 2/1 Income +$1000 Running Balance=$11000, Cleared/Reconciled Balance=
> $0, Budget=$11000
> 3/1 Food -$50 Running Balance=$10950, Cleared/Reconciled
> Balance= $0, Budget=$10950
> 4/1 <--- today Running Balance=$10950, Cleared/Reconciled
> Balance= $0, Budget=$10950
>
> 2. We create another Register Action: "Allocate Budget".
> "Allocate Budget" means we create a (b)udget transaction with multisplits
> from assets to expense accounts. By default we allocate the whole $10950. The
> $10950 in an asset account means "the amount remaining to allocate".
>
> 4/1 Budget Transaction type "b"
> Asset:Bank -$10950
> Expense:Food $200
> Expense:Gas $200
> Expense:Taxes $300
> Imbalance $10250
>
> Now the state of the Bank register is:
>
> 5/1 Running Balance=$10050, Cleared/Reconciled Balance=$0, Budget
> Balance= $0
>
> And the Food register is:
>
> 3/1 Food $50 Running Balance=$50 Cleared/Reconciled=$0 Budget=$50
> 4/1 Budget $200 Running Balance=$50 Cleared/Reconciled=$0 Budget=$250
> 5/1 <--- today Running Balance=$50 Cleared/Reconciled=$0 Budget=$250
>
> 3. We can allow the imbalance account to collect unbudgeted/spare monies. Or
> we can decide to allocate an amount smaller than $10950, leaving the 'budget'
> balance in the bank register a positive value.
>
> 4. Now the Food account has several balances accessible via API
>
> Running Balance $50 - as usual counts all split-values from "n" "y" "c"
> including future splits.
> Unreconciled $50 - counts splits-values from "n"
> Cleared $0 - counts splits-values from "n" "c"
> Reconciled $0 - counts splits-values from "n" "y" c"
> Budget $250 - counts all split-values from "n" "y" "c" "b"
>
> 5. A Budget report could be created, comparing the various expenses' running
> balances vs the budget balance. The difference is the amount left to spend in
> this category. For the food account it's 250-50 = $200 left to spend.
So you go through the trouble of creating a new split status to keep track of
the remaining budget, but still have to calculate the remaining budget?
>
> 6. Anytime the user wishes to allocate more budget to food, they can simply
> create (b)udget transaction from Bank or Imbalance account to the Food
> account.
>
> 7. This means, in the account register, we'll see regular transactions which
> can be reconciled with the bank statement. We'll also see budget
> transactions, not reconcilable with the bank statement. Perhaps they should
> be a different color/background. But this is ok, because their amounts do not
> affect the account running balance. The Reconcile window can also filter them
> out. The existing reports are unaffected. The query mechanism should ignore
> them by default.
>
> What do we think of this?
>
> The budget balance for an asset account represents "money remaining to
> allocate", and the budget balance for an expense account effectively
> represents "the upper limit that I'll allow this account to be". The budget
> balance, minus running balance represents "money left in envelope". I can
> increase envelope contents by transferring budget money from asset to the
> expense accounts.
>
> I wouldn't know how to handle credit card nor loan interest.
>
> I think it's an interesting thought experiment. The devil will be in the
> details.
>
> The advantage will be that the underlying code can handle this augmented
> functionality without major difficulty (famous last words.)
>
> Chris
In the short term, if the code for SX could either be borrowed, or amended to
allow for saving a template of a transaction that is then fired on demand (say
with a button) instead of on a date stamp, that could help tremendously paired
with the sub-account method outlined in the user thread. I think template
transactions are already an enhancement request, so there are other use cases
for this feature. The most prominent I can think of is payroll.
Regards,
Adrien
>
> On 31/01/18 15:59, David T. via gnucash-user wrote:
>> Matt,
>> I have to admit that I misread the tally; I did not see that the first $500
>> (AllocatedCash) was balancing the others. My apologies.
>> I'll let you and Adrien work this out, since I don't have a lot of
>> background in this.
>> David
>>
>> On Wed, Jan 31, 2018 at 8:58, Matt Graham<matt_graham2...@hotmail.com>
>> wrote: #yiv0595440679 #yiv0595440679 -- _filtered #yiv0595440679
>> {panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4;} _filtered #yiv0595440679
>> {font-family:Calibri;panose-1:2 15 5 2 2 2 4 3 2 4;}#yiv0595440679
>> #yiv0595440679 p.yiv0595440679MsoNormal, #yiv0595440679
>> li.yiv0595440679MsoNormal, #yiv0595440679 div.yiv0595440679MsoNormal
>> {margin:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;font-size:11.0pt;}#yiv0595440679 a:link,
>> #yiv0595440679 span.yiv0595440679MsoHyperlink
>> {color:blue;text-decoration:underline;}#yiv0595440679 a:visited,
>> #yiv0595440679 span.yiv0595440679MsoHyperlinkFollowed
>> {color:#954F72;text-decoration:underline;}#yiv0595440679
>> .yiv0595440679MsoChpDefault {} _filtered #yiv0595440679 {margin:72.0pt
>> 72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt;}#yiv0595440679 div.yiv0595440679WordSection1
>> {}#yiv0595440679
>> Hi Dave!
>>
>> Yep, that is pretty much the conclusion I’ve come to. Not sure what you
>> are asking about in “where are you balancing the funds”. The Cr and Dr are
>> balanced in the example. Maybe you are asking the location in the hierarchy
>> for the accounts? It all goes up to the root account “Assets”. For this
>> idea, I had Current Assets, Fixed assets, and Allocated Assets. All the
>> little allocation accounts were stored in the Allocated Assets branch.
>>
>> They were balanced by a single account under current assets called
>> “AllocatedCash” (as per the example below). This is the weird one – a
>> negative asset account that reflects how much I SHOULDN’T spend out of
>> current assets unless I am spending on my allocated causes.
>>
>> As per Adrian’s discussions, if you are spending out of the account that
>> you have put your sub-account into, then there are less splits and it is far
>> easier to understand. Using Adrien’s idea, at WORST you have a couple of
>> transactions that are just as complex as every transaction the other way –
>> but this is only in the rare event that you spend out of a different account
>> from that which your sub-account is in.
>>
>> I still haven’t fully wrapped my head around Adrien’s most recent email,
>> so that could create some more “Aha!” moments too.
>>
>> Thanks and regards,
>>
>> Matt
>>
>> From: David T.
>> Sent: Wednesday, 31 January 2018 2:31 PM
>> To: matt_graham2...@hotmail.com;Adrien Monteleone; gnucash-u...@gnucash.org
>> Subject: RE: Subaccounts [WAS Re: Future allocated money vs Budgets]
>>
>> Matt,
>> I see one huge problem: where are you balancing the funds for the
>> allocated accounts? They need balancing, and once you add something to
>> balance them, you might as well male them Subaccounts of checking anyway.
>> Cheers,
>> David
>>
>> On Wed, Jan 31, 2018 at 4:06, Matt Graham
>> <matt_graham2...@hotmail.com>
>> [Snip]
>>
>> If, rather than a sub-account, I use a separate asset account then there is
>> no balancing Cr to an asset to increase the allocation. In your example, you
>> had a balancing Cr on the parent when you allocated the money. So, we
>> receive a $1000 pay check, and want to allocate $500 to the four accounts:
>> Cr Income: Salary $1000
>> Dr Asset:Current:Checking $1000
>> Cr Asset:Current:AllocatedCash $500
>> Dr. Assets:Allocated:Vacation $250
>> Dr. Assets:Allocated:Insurance $150
>> Dr. Assets:Allocated:Dining $ 50
>> Dr. Assets:Allocated:Coffee&Tea $ 50
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