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My stubbornness about a spreadsheet cost me a whole weekend
I've always tracked my budget in a simple notebook, convinced any digital tool was overkill. Last Friday, I decided to finally move everything to a spreadsheet to calculate my average monthly spending. I figured it would take maybe an hour. The problem was, I had six months of handwritten notes with different categories and shorthand I'd forgotten. It took me all of Saturday and most of Sunday just to decipher and input the data correctly. Has anyone else had a simple budget task blow up like that? What's your go-to method now?
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hunt.hayden6mo ago
Sounds like you made a simple job way too hard. A weekend seems like a lot of time for what is basically just typing numbers. Maybe just use an app next time.
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jake_sullivan6mo ago
It was 1,200 receipts from a whole year of freelance work. Had to match each one to invoices and check for missing payments. An app wouldn't catch the mismatches.
5
sean486mo ago
Yeah, the "just type numbers" part is what gets me. It's never just typing. You have to stop and figure out if that $85 charge was for the client project or your own software, and then hunt down if the payment ever hit your account. That mental switching takes way more time than people realize.
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