Determined to master your money and stick to a budget in 2020? It doesn’t have to be boring or difficult if you keep it simple, and easier still if you let technology do the heavy lifting for you.
1. Pocketbook
Pocketbook automatically organises your spending into categories like clothes, groceries and fuel, showing you where money is being spent. You can also set up budgets for each category, see your balances and view your transactions. The app ensures all your bills are automatically detected and in the one place. Plus, you get notified when bill payments are coming up and if you have enough money to cover them.
2. MoneyBrilliant
Want to have a personal financial assistant in your pocket? According to their website, that’s just what you’ll get with MoneyBrilliant. This app is similar to Pocketbook as it connects your bank accounts to help you monitor your finances. The basic version also allows you to connect your credit cards, loans, superannuation and investment accounts. Other basic features include creating budgets, getting bill notifications, categorizing expenses, working out your net worth, and generating spending reports.
With the plus plan, you get access to a whole host of other features and services. The upgrade provides alerts for better deals from service providers, recommendations for optimising your accounts and products to making your finances simpler and sorts your expenses into tax deduction categories.
3. PocketSmith
In its basic version PocketSmith is similar to MoneyBrilliant and Pocketbook, with automatic imports of bank transactions and access to reports summarising your financial activity. It also offers features like digital and cash spending projections, calendars and a choice of either daily, weekly or monthly flexible budgeting options to suit your lifestyle and financial needs.
4. Goodbudget
If you’re a fan of the old-fashioned ways of managing your finances, this could be the app for you. And as you can’t sync it to your bank accounts, you might also prefer Goodbudget if you’re not completely comfortable with sharing bank details with an app.
Goodbudget takes the envelope system digital. Instead of dividing cash for rent, bills and savings between paper envelopes, you get to create up to 10 virtual ones with the basic version of this app. By doing this you can direct your income to where it’s needed, making sure essential expenses are covered and stopping you from overspending on extras. The Plus plan gives you access to unlimited envelopes and the ability to use the app from more devices.
5. WiseList
With more of a focus on helping you save this app brings a couple of extra elements to managing your budget and bills. It’s designed to help you spend less on your food bills, with features for comparing product prices and getting family members working together on shopping lists.
You can also keep track of loyalty points you’re earning as you shop and plan to save even more with app notifications when your favourite products are on special. It has some handy features for keeping on top of your other bills too. Simply take a photo of each bill and the app will store all the important information and alert you before the due date.
- Finder
Launched in 2020, the Finder app brings together the money-tracking capability seen in other apps with their well-known comparison data for financial products and services. Not only can this app sync with your bank accounts, it also gives you regular updates on your credit score and savings tips based on analysis of what you’re spending money on.
7. Beem It
An independent company backed by Commonwealth Bank, NAB and Westpac, Beem It is an Aussie version of the popular US bill-splitting app, SplitWise. With Beem It, you can take the hassle and awkwardness out of sharing expenses with friends by making it easy to calculate each person’s share and make requests for payment as well as transfers.
Source: Money and Life