Open Planning → Spending to review a household's recorded transactions, cash flow, and spending patterns. Spending uses linked or imported transaction history; it doesn't automatically replace the household spending amount entered in Profile.
What is the Spending option in client files?
Spending is a household's transaction workspace, and its current navigation label is Spending without a Beta badge. Advisors open Planning → Spending; clients open Spending in their portal.
Use Transactions to inspect individual entries, Cash flow to review money in and out for a period, and Analyze to examine patterns over time. Categories, Tags, and Rules organize how transactions appear and count. Clients reach those management pages through Manage.
For account connections, see Linking Accounts and Understanding Synced Data. For statement files or a transaction export, see Importing Transactions from a Bank or Credit Card Statement. A linked balance alone doesn't establish that all transaction history is available.
How do I start reviewing Spending?
Start an advisor review in Planning → Spending → Transactions, with a known account and date range you can compare against source records.
Open the sliders icon with the Filter transactions tooltip and choose an account and dates for your review.
Open an unfamiliar transaction to inspect its details before changing its category or hiding it.
Open Cash flow, select a period, and examine the largest inflows and outflows. Cash flow keeps separate filters; to review one account, open its sliders icon and choose that account again.
Open Analyze after checking the source history and classifications. Analyze covers visible household transactions and has no account filter.
Categorizing and Filtering Transactions explains individual corrections and filters. Spending Rules: Automatically Categorize Transactions in Bulk covers repeated patterns. Confirm that transfers, refunds, missing accounts, and overlapping imports are handled consistently before treating a total as representative household spending.
Why does Spending open on an earlier month?
In Spending, Cash flow and Analyze open on the most recent month with visible inflow or outflow activity when you haven't chosen a month. An empty current month doesn't take priority over an earlier month with activity.
Hidden transactions, transfers, zero-amount entries, and future-dated transactions don't determine the starting month. If no qualifying activity exists, the default is the current month.
Choose another period in Cash flow, or select a month in Analyze, to review a different date range. Cash flow chooses its starting period from household activity before applying its separate filters, so an account filter can leave that period empty. Check the displayed period and source coverage before interpreting a zero total.
How do I read Cash flow in Spending?
Spending's Cash flow summarizes recorded transactions for a selected period. Inflows and Outflows normally show positive totals. Outflows shows a minus sign when refunds in spending categories are larger than the spending for that period.
Net is inflows minus outflows; transfers appear separately and aren't added to either side of that calculation.
Open Planning → Spending → Cash flow.
Choose Monthly, Quarterly, or Yearly, then select a period in the chart.
Choose Category, Group, or Merchant to organize the breakdown.
Select a breakdown entry to inspect its transactions. That detail view also offers Daily and Weekly.
A refund assigned to a spending category reduces that category's outflows. Hidden entries don't count in the Cash flow summary. Filters narrow the records being summarized; clear a narrow review before interpreting household totals.
Savings rate normally divides Net by inflows. It is unavailable without positive inflows, shows 0% when inflows are less than 1% of outflows, and disappears while search or additional filters narrow the view. It isn't a measure of contributions entered in Profile.
What does Analyze show?
In Planning → Spending → Analyze, choose a month to review recorded spending patterns. Analyze excludes hidden transactions and future-dated entries; it doesn't certify that an institution supplied complete history.
Outflows shows up to 12 months of activity. Its Total (the phone default), Category group (the desktop default), and Essential vs discretionary choices change the breakdown.
Selecting Essential vs discretionary reveals Edit priorities, which opens Categories. Select a month with activity to open its Cash flow details.
When spending happens shows a spending calendar. Spending pace compares cumulative outflows with Previous month, Previous 3-month average, or Same month last year, when enough history exists. Missing history can disable a comparison.
Top merchants shows merchant activity for the selected month. Its change comparison uses the previous month.
It is withheld if the selected month’s recorded data ends before month-end, or if either month lacks recorded activity from the start of the month. Recurring charges identifies repeated patterns as of today, even when you select an older analysis month; confirm those patterns against actual bills before treating them as commitments.
What does the 12-month comparison table mean?
In Spending's Analyze view, Cash flow compared with last 12 months' average compares recent monthly amounts with a longer history. It groups Money in and Money out and includes Net saved, calculated as money in minus money out.
Select Last month, 3 months, or 6 months to change the recent period. Difference is that recent monthly amount or average minus the longer-period monthly average. Expand a group to see its categories; category activity can be opened in Cash flow.
Despite the 12-month labels, the table can appear with 6–11 complete recorded months. It uses up to 12 qualifying months through the selected month and excludes incomplete months and months without recorded activity. With fewer than 6 complete recorded months, the panel shows “This needs at least six complete months of activity.” This means insufficient history, not zero spending.
“Complete” reflects the span of recorded transactions. Compare account coverage and dates with source records before interpreting a change as a household trend.
Why doesn't Spending match Profile Cash flow?
Spending totals transaction activity, while Profile → Cash flow → Spending holds a separate household planning amount. Categorizing, tagging, hiding, or importing transactions doesn't automatically set that Profile amount.
Profile can use a manually entered total or calculate spending with Zero out surplus from income, savings, Giving, and taxes. Transactions don't supply that calculation.
On the advisor’s Profile Spending panel, Total Spending includes debt payments. Kerdora subtracts Current Debt Payments to show Annual Expenses, or Monthly Expenses when Mo is selected.
For Profile entry and client-entry differences, see Cash Flow: Income, Savings, Spending, Debt Payments, and Giving. When comparing the two pages, check transaction dates, account coverage, transfers, refunds, one-time purchases, and hidden entries before deciding whether a planning assumption needs revision.
Can clients see Spending or include it in a Guide?
Clients can open Spending in their portal and use Transactions, Cash flow, Analyze, and Manage for Categories, Tags, and Rules. Those pages use the household's shared transaction data; client corrections aren't a separate advisor-only copy.
A Guide can also contain the Income Statement component (titled “Income statement” by default), which summarizes actual transactions and excludes hidden entries. Its period choices include Latest month, Trailing 3 months, Trailing 12 months, Year to date, and All transactions. This component is distinct from Guide components based on Profile cash-flow assumptions.
For adding a component, see Guide Components: Content, Filters, and Scope. For delivery, see Delivering a Guide to a Client. Neither a Guide summary nor the portal turns Spending into a person-by-person or card-by-card budget manager; see Can I Set a Spending Budget in Kerdora?