Using Favorites

Creating a Favorite

MoneyWell automatically creates a favorite when you assign a bucket to a transaction. It tries to learn your common transactions and save you time in the future. You can also create a favorite manually by going to Favorites from the Cash Flow view filter bar and then clicking + in the top right corner.

By default, a favorite remembers the payee, type, and bucket for a transaction. These are the three most common fields. If you just want a favorite to speed up the typing of a payee name, uncheck the box before both the "Type" and "Bucket" entries. If you want to include other values for a standard transaction, check the boxes in front of those entries.

Whatever you have checked in a favorite will be assigned to a transaction when you allow an autocomplete of a favorite payee name. If you have a very consistent transaction, like a cable bill, you can include the type, amount, and bucket. This speeds up the data entry of that transaction to just a couple of characters in the payee name.

Aliases

When transactions are downloaded or imported from a financial institution, they typically have very cluttered payee names and no bucket assignment. This means that you have to post process your imported transaction set by cleaning up the payees and assigning buckets. A better solution is to let MoneyWell do that work for you, which is where the aliases come into play.

An alias is a unique part of a payee or memo that you can use to match what is imported. An imported transaction might have the payee name set to "STARBUCKS #849 SAN MAT" but you want it to read "Starbucks" and have it assigned to your "Dining" bucket. Follow these steps:

1. Import your transactions
2. Click the one named "STARBUCKS #849 SAN MAT"
3. Change the payee to "Starbucks"
4. Assign the "Dining" bucket

At this point, MoneyWell has already created a favorite for you called "Starbucks" set as a withdrawal assigned to the "Dining" bucket with two aliases named "STARBUCKS #849 SAN MAT" and "Starbucks". Now the next time you go to Starbucks, this favorite will clean up your imported payee name and assign it to Dining.

And you didn't have to do anything but edit that one transaction.

Stopping Favorites from Altering Imports

There are times when you don't want MoneyWell to assign a bucket automatically to an imported transaction. Some stores have such a variety of items that you could be buying groceries there the one day and automobile tires the next. To stop a favorite that MoneyWell created automatically from assigning a bucket, simply edit that favorite and uncheck the bucket value. That's it. MoneyWell will clean up the payee name and set the type, but not touch the bucket on the next import. Do the same with the type if you don't want that automatically assigned during an import.

Some payee names in export files are very generic. You may have "ATM WITHDRAWAL" or "CHECK" on hundreds of transactions that come from your bank. If MoneyWell has created a favorite for you with a generic alias, follow these steps:

1. Switch to the favorites list on the Cash Flow view
2. Click on the favorite with the generic alias
3. Select the unwanted (generic) alias in the Info panel
4. Right-click and choose Move to Ignored Aliases List

You're all set. MoneyWell will no longer assign an imported transaction that has that generic name in the payee or memo to this (or any future) favorite.