Make Use Of Envelope Budgeting With Ez Budget
Ez Budget for iPad - Quick Envelope Budgeting ($4.99) by Derek Clark makes use of envelope budgeting to keep track of your spending.
Envelope budgeting follows three simple (yet often hard to do) rules: First, you don’t “borrow” money from other envelopes if one runs out. Second, you remain strict about the envelopes (i.e. "eating out" is not "groceries"). Lastly, if you do run out of money in an envelope, you’ll need to be resourceful until you can add more money to it.
If you can train yourself to follow the rules, envelope budgeting can be a highly effective budgeting method.
The categories can be edited to fit your needs, though the app does a good job of listing the basics. “Envelopes” go inside each category, which list specific things to pay for. The envelopes are just titles, though it would be nice to see a graphic of actual envelopes.
You can use the app to search for supported bank accounts to attach. I tried adding my own bank account, and while the app found it, logging on with my credentials didn’t work. However, you can still use it to manually key in information.
Do you have a joint account? Dropbox can be used to save your account information in a database file. Once uploaded, other iDevices will be able to access the database, modify it, and save it again for Ez Budget. Those familiar with editing wikis will be familiar with the rules for this: only one person can modify the database at a time and he or she must close the app to allow others to edit it.
Functionally, the app works to manage your money. However, it is bare bones in design and functionality. For example, there is no way to clear out all of the information if you have set up manual transactions. The categories also get cramped on the far left of the screen. Scrolling is available, though the Dropbox icon takes up valuable real estate.
As the app stands as of the writing of this article, there is no help documentation provided. The developer has stated that an update is pending approval in the App Store.
If envelope budgeting works for you, or if you think it could improve your spending habits, you might want to give this app a try. Of course, the process could be accomplished just the same in Numbers.
There is an iPhone version of Ez Budget available as well.
