As alluded to elsewhere, I’m not full Monzo right now. Never say never about going back, but I thought I’d share what I’ve discovered to replace Trends - an open source project called Actual Budget
It’s a super cool (at least I think it is) open source app that tracks accounts and does budgeting. It does that envelope budgeting thing that folk seem to like as well as normal, or what Actual calls ‘tracked’, budgeting. But I’m mostly using it to store years and years of backdate and to create my own reports. It’s basically like a souped up version of Trends. The clincher for me was that it can use Go Cardless to sync data using open banking - and Go Cardless doesn’t charge for small volumes of open banking transactions each month.
This is what my reports screen looks like (it’s pretty customisable):
(The two dotted line graphs are average spends each month - it’s the first of the month so you can’t see the solid tracking line that shows whether you’re above or below average. I’ve got it set up to show if I’m above or below spending and above/below savings).
Tthe transactions look a bit like this (not my screen because too much to redact):
There’s no mobile app, but there is a responsive web view. It’s not quite there yet for everyday consumption imo (it’s a bit slow and you can’t have a combined accounts feed yet) but it shows lots of promise. I host it on PikaPods which costs me under a quid a month, but I’m flirting with the idea of self hosting.
Anyway, that’s one of the things I’m using now. Anyone else on the Actual train? Or any other solutions folk are using instead?
P.S. I’m waiting for Revels to dust off a topic from 2018 where Actual is mentioned in passing. I think I probably found it from on here, but my search skills weren’t up to the task…
I used to go to the nth degree of analysis using all sorts of offline/online services and weened myself off them over time to concentrate on the tools available in the app. While they’re certainly not complete, or for everyone, I find I can trust the figures and it saves me a TON of time cross-referencing data points.
So while I love a good service, I won’t be trying to add additional services to my current level of financial ops.
I was the same. But after Monzo messed up my backdata (there’s a topic about it somewhere) and I got seduced by T212’s cashback but no open data connection, Trends lost its lustre sadly.
I’m very here for improvements to Trends, but sadly I think I’m in power use mode having outgrown the solution for the masses.
That said, whilst not perfect Trends is the best mass market product out there.
I keep meaning to give this a try! In the process of overhauling my budget for the year, so now’s the perfect time!
Gives me one more hobby for my Mac Mini home server if I self host, which I don’t mind for something like this, since I’m still just using Numbers.
Long term for me though, it’s probably gonna need an app, too. Mentioned it in my subscription review, but Monzo extra is a very attractive prospect just for that trends data via open banking.
Ba__ could either mean Bank of Scotland or Barclays.
Ca__ could be Cashplus
Ch__ is most likely Chase seeing what you said above.
Co__ could either mean Co-op bank or Coventry Building Society
You’ve got a hell of a lot of “Mo” which is obviously Monzo
Na__ is most likely Nationwide seeing what you’ve said about it, although it could be a cheeky Natwest account as well.
Nice to see “Sta” there. Love Starling Bank.
Tra__ is a little more tricky. My best guess is Trading212 though
Zo__ suggests Zopa to me.
Then [Ol___ perhaps means Old account. Other than that I got nothing
I’m still a bit meh on Chase. Just been using them because JPM has been happy to fund decent savings and cashback rates. Nationwide is nice, solid, a mutual and has good support.
I’d still be with Monzo if they fixed their customer support. And, you know, properly supported paid for features.
Monzo customer support puts me off using them for everything as well so I totally understand you there.
I’d probably be using Chase if I was allowed back after the falsely promised 12 month wait. I did jump the gun closing but they didn’t even have direct debits at the time and I believed the 12 months.
Always assume they don’t have the process built at the time they launch with that policy. Monzo and N26 were exactly the same, and I think Algbra, since they’re ghosting @ndrw.
I don’t know if that’s totally a safe assumption though. I had accounts back with Starling and Monzo after the initial period so it would be safe to assume this message would ring true. I got told up to 11 months in I’d be able to apply and was even given a date.
And then one day evidently the message CS were told to day changed, and it just went to “we might let people back but there’s no timescale”.
Anyway I’m not actually bothered now, HSBC does me fine and Numbers does the additional detail needed.
app. While they’re certainly not complete, or for everyone, I find I can trust the figures and it saves me a TON of time cross-referencing data points.
