What is the goal of your workflow? What problem does it solve, or how does it help you?
The goal of this workflow is to give a rundown of the current month’s finances. It can be viewed by account or as a general overview. It is a quick reference tool for 1) viewing upcoming and past due payments and deposits, 2) viewing actual vs. forecasted spend/deposits through the current day of the month, and 3) viewing forecasted balances in each account for the current month.
How did you come up with the idea for your workflow?
I keep the money in my checking account as low as possible since it doesn’t pay much interest, while simultaneously minimizing the number of deposits/ withdrawls I do from my savings account each month. In order to do so, I needed a way to forecast the cashflow of my checking account. It gave me a way of tracking my forecasted balances so that I would not overdraw on my account. Subsequently, I found that this could be used as a way to ensure that I do not spend too much on discretionary items.
Please describe your workflow. What are the sheets? Does it use any custom scripts or formulas?
On the spreadsheet entitled “Instructions” are the instructions for inputting information into each tab.
On the spreadsheet entitled “Budget Worksheet”, data is entered to track the forecasted budget. Each overall category can be separated in as many line items as needed. For instance, a person could set up a line item for each bill that needs to be paid, and each bill can still be in the category of “Bills”. Also, let’s say, for instance, that a bill will be paid out of multiple accounts throughout the year. This worksheet allows for multiple line items to track that bill so that it can be separated by account. Finally, as this spreadsheet is populated, it pulls information from the “Transactions” spreadsheet, and highlights the dollar amounts that have been paid (green), are upcoming (yellow), or are past due (red). This spreadsheet has may custom formulas that are all hidden as a way to keep users from accidentally erasing them. In future use, these formulas would be locked down.
On the spreadsheet entitled “Current Month Dashboard”, users can select an account name. The rest of the data automatically updates. If the account name is left blank, the data will update with information from every account. This is the spreadsheet that gives a broad overview of each account, including 1) current balance, 2) projected EOM balance, 3) projected low and high balances, 4) upcoming payments/ deposits, 5) past due payments/deposits, and 6) payments/deposits already made. The formulas on this page would be locked down in future use.
On the spreadsheet entitled “Projected Account Balance”, projected account balances by day are updated automatically. the account reflected is the one specified on the “Current Month Dashboard” spreadsheet. If no account is specified, this spreadsheet will be blank.
The spreadsheets entitled “Projected Category Totals” and “Categories” are used to populate data on other spreadsheets. They update automatically.
On the “Transactions” spreadsheet, I added two columns to create unique identifiers that can be used for tracking purposes on other tabs. “Alt Description” populates with the first ten characters from the “Description” column. This is what needs to be populated onto “Budget Worksheet”. The column entitled “Alt Description & Month” is used in determining if a particular item on the “Budget Worksheet” tab has been paid/deposited.
Anything else you’d like people to know?
Is it ok for others to copy, use, and modify your workflow?
Yes.
If you said yes above, please make a copy of your workflow and share the copy’s URL:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-uPH_Z3dLsJx89lMTK5MQBCH4lkdXjlhUwgphSRrO9M/template/preview