I use flags to keep track of all of my online purchases. Everything I've ordered stays purple until I receive it so I can make sure nothing gets lost in the mail!
Attention all beautiful YNABers! As of today, you can now assign flags in bulk! To do so, simply select allllllll the transactions you want to flag with a particular color, click the "Edit" menu, hover over "Flag," and select the flag color you want to assign! Easy as peasy. I mean pie. Easy as peasy pie. Okay. Happy budgeting! -Hannah :)
I use a purple flag to flag transactions that I need to claim back on my tax return at the end of the financial year. Come tax time, I simply use the search bar to look for purple-flagged transactions over the last year. I also leave the flags on these transactions permanently for future reference. It makes my life super easy. 😊
I do like flags but find the implementation very limiting and hope YNAB expands on it in the future. First off, there are only 6 of them. Secondly, the fact that they are just colors with no editable name, means I essentially need to keep a "key" handy so I know what flag is what. Then because there are only 6 of them it means that I often share colors for short term and long term, making my "key" even more complex. I really wish I could just create/delete flags as desired, with a chosen color AND a short name.
My wife and I used flags to communicate with each other thru YNAB. Particularly, when we din't know what a particular charge the other had made on credit card was for. I just flagged them blue to indicate to her, I didn't know what it was for (and guessed the category to use).. When she would see the blue flag, she would categorize it properly, if required, and then tell me in the memo what it was for, and change the flag to purple which equalled "resolved". Was a great system for us.
I use a specific flag color to indicate all charitable donations. Makes it super easy at tax time to filter for the flag color and see all of my donations in one fell swoop.
I would use the flags way more if we could name them because I have a terrible memory! I know the Toolkit allows me to name them, but it seems to clear or reset every now and then so I just stopped using them. Amazing update idea for YNAB!!!
The 8 tips covered in this video: Long Term Flag Uses: Track trends (responsible spending vs impulse buying) Track events (ie: moving costs) Track reimbursements (Different color per step in reimbursement process) Separate irregular purchases from typical budget activity (ie: car buying) Debt paydown awareness (all debt payments flagged one color) Short Term Flag Uses: Uncertain category (partner's transaction) Reminder to split transaction later Uncleared checks
I never even paid attention to the flag option before. Thanks, Hannah! Once again, you have shown me things I could do with YNAB that I didn’t even know I wanted to do.
I have some 1099 income, and I flag any purchases that are tax deductible. That way I don’t have to go hunting through my credit card statements at tax time!
I use a flag for repeating payments that I don’t know the real value, e.g. my electricity bill is scheduled for $xxx every month , but the actual amount varies each month. So a yellow flag means “I need to check the amount”
Similar to the short term reasons you mentioned, I use flags when the amount I've spent is uncertain and I'll need to correct it later. For example, I went shopping and didn't get a paper reciept, and I know I spent aaaabout £15 but I can't remember how much exactly. That's fine, stick in a £15 transaction with a red flag, come back once it shows up on my bank statement and make it more precise. Another example, I bought something on the internet in another currency. I know my bank will charge a small currency exchange fee but I don't know how much. Put in a transaction, red flag, refer to bank statement and correct later! Also, hi YNAB video team, these videos are fantastic as always, very easy to watch and very very helpful! Thank you!! Keep it up!
You are so funny! Just another reason I love YNAB! I use flags for some tax deductible expenses, like daycare - or business expenses for our side hustle catering business. :)
We just recently tried the flags. We mark them for each car and for our own spending. So if we get gas in one car, we mark it yellow and the other car is blue. That way we can look back at how much gas each car used and keep them all within the "Fuel" category. Same for our coffee category. If my husband buys it or if I do, we each have our own color. But I agree with the others. I wish there were a key to remember what each flag is for!!
I love the idea of flags! If I were to make a suggestion, I think it would be helpful if there was a line at the bottom where you could create your own flag “key”, to help remember what each flag indicates. Still in my trial month but loving YNAB so far!
Whenever I purchase something in a foreign currency, it hits my bank account straight away as one amount, by when it finally clears days later, the amount is finalised and currency exchange being what it is, the number is different. Before I realised this, it REALLY messed with my reconciliations because a number previously reconciled had now changed. So I flag it. Then when I get the final updated amount, I update the line entry and remove the flag.
I use mine for different members of the family. Any supplies, activities, gifts, clothing for my 4 year old gets marked as blue. My baby gets green for anything for him, etc.
I occasionally use red flags for scheduled renewals (annual or monthly subscriptions) that I may want to cancel before the renewal date. I apply an earlier date to the scheduled transaction so it appears like a reminder, before the actual payment date (the actual payment date can be noted in the memo field). 🙂🚩🛑💰
Love me some flags, Hannah! I have an online business and use one YNAB budget for both personal and business transactions. I use flags for the business transactions. So GREEN is for income, RED is for expenses and PURPLE is for home office expenses (like internet, utilities, rent, etc.). Then at tax time I export my YNAB budget and delete all line items that don't have flags and boom, there's my taxes half done! Thanks for the vid as always :)
That's very cool. I like how easy you made that. However I recommend you get different accounts for personal vs business. If you ever get audited, you'll be so glad they don't want to look through everything. It also means you have all income and expenses already in one place. You still have a pull a report on home expenses but you are already doing that.
Love the comparison of flags as post it notes! I have one single person who insists on a physical check payment each month instead of an electronic payment. Consequently, I spend 3-4 weeks waiting for this person to cash the check so it can clear the bank. I always flag this transaction in red to remind me why it hasn’t cleared. Love these videos!
Oh my word, Kelly-stressful!! When I first started babysitting in junior high, I once waited six months before I cashed a check because I didn't really understand why that would be an issue. When I handed the check to the teller and she saw the date, her eyes grew to the size of Jupiter 😂 Then I got a slight-but-kind talking to, and now I cash checks same/next day. Oh, the lessons of our youth! -Hannah :)
I use quite a few flags. Red is normally a place holder and should be deleted. Blue are scheduled through automatic payment systems. Orange needs more information such as splits or details from spouse. Purple are automatic payments that will likely fail and need to be reconfigured. Yellow are prepurchases where the product will arrive at a later date. Honestly, I don't know if I could function without the flags. lol
This is super useful! I've been using YNAB for years and never used the flags feature. From now on I'm definitely going to use it when I've asked for a refund for something and then when the refund arrives. And I'll use it when I need to ask my husband in which category a transaction belongs. So far I've been putting '???' in the Notes space whenever I needed to ask him, but a flag is prettier :)
Hannah, your videos make me so happy and make budgeting so much more accessible to me emotionally because of the light-hearted way that you approach this topic. I
Frankie!! What in the world?! You are so kind!! I'm so glad to be here and if all I ever accomplish in life is that I made budgeting slightly less intimidating and a little more fun, I'll consider it a win 😊 Glad to have you here!! -Hannah :)
I use tags to keep with purchases made on my credit card. All purchases made between payoffs are assigned a color so I know exactly what the lump payment on the card covered
I've suggested this through the app in the past but it would be useful to be able to select multiple entries and flag them all as the same color. Right now when I have a bunch of transactions it is a pain to go through every single one and flag it. Hopefully it can happen one day!
This was posted in the feed: Attention all beautiful YNABers! As of today, you can now assign flags in bulk! To do so, simply select allllllll the transactions you want to flag with a particular color, click the "Edit" menu, hover over "Flag," and select the flag color you want to assign! Easy as peasy. I mean pie. Easy as peasy pie. Okay. Happy budgeting! -Hannah :)
I work at a grocery store, so I often grab a snack or my lunch on break, and this gets lumped into the grocery category. I'm trying to do this less though, so everytime I buy something for immediate consumption at work, it gets red flagged. It helps me track those uber specific impulsebuys
Yes!! So smart! You know yourself, so make your budget work for you. Best of luck on breaking that habit! I know those are so, so hard to leave behind! -Hannah 🌻
I just used flags when reconciling an account to mark it as "maybe in the wrong account." Then I could easily find it in the "all accounts" list of transactions and see if it matched anything in another account, at which point I could delete it or remove the flag.
I use flags to mark transactions that get paid from our fun money accounts. I search by the flag color, select all, and YNAB tells me how much to pay the credit card from the fun money accounts. When I pay, I switch the flag to a different color. I use our school colors so I know whose is whose.
I started using flags last year as a way to know what expenses are for work, family, kids only, personal and couple. It was chocking when I saw all expenses related to "personal" and "work", usually they are hidden under other categories (snacks, groceries, etc), but not anymore. Thanks for this video!!! 😉
Whee! Time to join in the flagging fun! I flag transactions based on the type of receipt I've validated the transaction against. Yellow for paper receipt, orange for digital receipt, blue for no receipt (vending machines, I'm looking at you!) and red for OMGWHEREISTHERECEIPT? Green for income, purple for transfers. All part of the reconciliation process! Also, thanks Hannah! I asked for multi-transaction flagging months ago! Excited!
Yes! A long requested feature and we're so excited to finally release it to the wild! Thanks for sharing your tips and work flow! Always appreciated. -Hannah 🌻
i use flags to indicate my auto-pays, transfers between accounts and cash that needs to be pulled. the colors correspond with my paper planner budget so I can keep everything organized. this was a great video btw.
I am pretty simple with my flags; red is for a pending transaction and blue is for when it has cleared my account and if I have to make an adjustment due to it it not reconciling I flag it orange. I do like the idea of short term flags and may use some she mentioned. Love your videos Hannah!
How fun would it be to have a rainbow budget?! Glad you're finding the videos helpful!! Keep it up! -Hannah :)
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I use flags to identify who did the spending. One color for me, and another for her. It's easier to recall why we spent on that, or to blame impulse purchases. 😜
Hey now, THAT'S a brilliant one I hadn't thought of! Definitely helps with clarity and assigning categorizing responsibilities within the budget. I love that! Thanks so much for sharing!! -Hannah :)
I have never shared a comment about YNAB but now watching this video I can tell that YNAB is an Essential tool to really keep control of your money and educate oneself of the money habits we have. I have used consistently since 2019 and this have really make a difference in my life about how I manage my money for good. Great Great tool.
thanks so much! I have never used a flag until today, but I am off to start tracking my good purchases, bad purchases and purchases to be considered :) THANK YOU
Same! I had never used flags before making this video (we all gotta start somewhere, yeah?!) and now I'm tracking money well spent with orange (my favorite color), unnecessary spending with yellow (because I don't like red, and yellow means "yield" or "slow down"), and student loan payments with green (because 🤑🤮). We're twins! -Hannah :)
I'm new to YNAB and just setting up my budget. I can already see a great use for flags. We are trying to prune our spending and in looking at our bank statements over the past few months, I see subscriptions that we need to cancel to get our budget in shape. Flagging will be a great way to remind me to make sure those expenses get cancelled.
Yes!! And fun fact-coming soon to a budget near you: flag *labels*. Soon enough you'll be able to name your purple flags "Cancel me!" and your yellow flags "Work reimbursements!" 🌻 Hannah
Great video 🚩 I use flags on my recurring transactions so they stand out compared to daily transactions (software business subscriptions - orange / any fees that I could avoid otherwise with better budgeting - red).
Oh Hannah you have become a part of my sunshiny day. Please keep up the good work and know you have a fan in me! Love the content and for making budgeting cool!
I use flags in my spend (checking) account to keep track of which monthly payments are automatically deducted and which I have to actually REMEMBER to pay! Red ones stay red all the time, month after month. For the manually-paid bills, I add a green flag. Once reconciled, I go to the top of the list and remove the green flag for that same upcoming bill for the following month. This lets me keep track of which of those few manually-paid monthly bills I have already paid and which I haven't. (Looking back, the colors don't seem to fit, but hey, it's been working for me for several years now lol).
I use an orange flag when I'm reconciling my credit card if a transaction is pending. I also use flags in my "scheduled transactions". I use a "yellow flag" when I have updated the correct amount of an upcoming bill. And I change it to a "green flag" when I have scheduled a payment for that bill on Bill Pay. That way I know that it has been set up on payment for a future date, and I don't need to worry about it.
This came at the perfect time. I didn't stop to enter the transaction, I know kinda how much I spent but not exactly, the receipt could be anywhere, and it hasn't hit my bank account yet. Red flag it is!
We have to make a certain amount of debit card swipes with our CU account so we flag them and counting them is easier. Also, I use a flag when I enter a transaction with a temporary amount cause sometimes I don't take a receipt and I promptly forget the precise total.
Whoa! I've never heard of a minimum swipe count before! But that's really smart-filter out your transactions to only show those flags, count em up, and then meet your end of the month quota. Love that. And same with me and forgetting! I can't tell you how many times they tell me the total, I repeat it all the way back to my seat or my car, then have no idea what it was despite how intentional I tried to be about it. Reminds me of this scene from Boy Meets World 😂 th-cam.com/video/ZDJJWHcjylY/w-d-xo.html -Hannah :)
I use flags for transactions completed over venmo. This is helpful because I typically reconcile my account balances by looking at my online bank or credit card statements, however, venmo transactions just show up as "venmo" on my checking account with no further information. Also, if the venmo balance isn't sent to the back quickly enough the actual venmo->checking account transactions may actually reflect multiple venmo transactions. I want to make sure all venmo transactions (paying someone for eating out, which should be properly categorized as eating out, for example) are properly categorized. The flag indicates the fact that venmo transactions require a little more care with bookkeeping.
Even after this (great) video I still was unsure what flags could do for me, but I love the suggestions people leave here in the comments! The ones I liked most were about this: flag stuff you think could have been avoided. It can be done with just a red flag or more nuanced like with red, orange, and yellow. Then every year you can see if that gives room for improvement. It is nice to have this 'meta-system' on top of the categories.
I like to use one color flag to mark the last transaction which cleared the bank when I reconciled last. (Purple - fave color). I also like to use Orange for any follow up necessary (mostly checking split transaction amounts). I also use Red to mean something is wrong and I need to look into it further.
Right?! Gonna be honest, neither did I 😂 Now I'm tracking necessary vs unnecessary spending as well as debt payment contributions (student loans, I'm comin' for ya!). -Hannah :)
I use flags all the time to show category spending trends. I would love more colors though and the option to flag each category in a split transaction. That would be very helpful for me.
neonnn123 I like being able to see my spending trends in my transaction list by account (not necessarily all my accounts combined). I can see at a glance the places I’m spending at as well as the categories all at once. The reports are good for the big picture (although I wish I could reassign the category colors to match my flags) but for the at a glance or more detailed pictures of my trends they don’t work for me.
Reflection! Love that. Any active practice with my budget that increases the awareness of my spending is so, so good to motivate change and better habits. Awesome idea! -Hannah :)
I use flags as a color coding system for the type of transaction that entry is. Red is money leaving the budget, green is money coming in, orange is paying debt, blue is credit to a credit line, yellow is transfers of money from one asset account to another, and purple is created debt. For anything specific I need to note about a transaction I make liberal and flagrant use of the memo line. I just leave those on the entries permanently, so I'm a long-term flagger. :) Lots of great ideas in the video too!
I use flags to track our respective car expenses. So blue for his car, purple for mine. That way we can see which car is costing us how much in repairs/maintenance and gas. Short term for something I need to pay attention to.
Brilliant! I think the best part of that is being able to look up either flag color and pull up ALL the expenses that specific car has incurred in it's lifetime-so handy. -Hannah :)
Thanks for the ideas!!! My family use purple flag for technique #6 just to remind us that we need to review that transaction that showed up in our credit card and split/categorize it properly. green flags indicate recurrent payments that I don't have to worry about, like internet, mobile phone service and etc. I like the suggestion of flagging reimbursement transactions!
Renaming flags was one of the top feature requests in YNAB4. What could be the possible reasons it was not done already? I read it's considered but newer actual explanation why it's not already done (not even "our houses would be burned down and cat peed on by rival gang").
It won't work for the mobile interface, but you can rename the flags if you use the YNAB Toolkit: chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/toolkit-for-ynab/lmhdkkhepllpnondndgpgclfjnlofgjl?hl=en
I have to keep a paper note on my desk to remind me of the meaning of the flags I am using. The ability to name flags seems so simple, I am surprised it has not been implemented.
@@derekcassells8341 if you're not using the YNAB toolkit I highly recommend it. It has a lot of features that, IMO, really should be part of the standard package
Currently, there is not. Feel free to reach out to support with that feature request!! We're always looking for customer feedback on how to improve! -Hannah 🌻
Blue: a transaction I entered in the moment so I know it is categorized correctly but I didn't keep the receipt, like groceries or fast food. Green: a transaction I entered in the moment and I am keeping the receipt, for tax or reimbursement purposes. Gray - means the transaction was added by import and I need to check it and make sure it's legit/properly categorized. Once I check it I mark it blue or green depending on if I have a receipt or not. That way I don't have to wonder or go looking for a receipt I'm never going to find. Red: something needs fixing. Yellow: scheduled transactions I entered ahead of time but that may or may not be correct. Mostly used for easily entering my paychecks with all my regular splits each month.
I flag scheduled transactions red if the dollar value needs to be checked and perhaps updated. I use green flags in the app to indicate a ‘soft reconcile’. Tells me that up to this transaction ynab accounts and bank accounts are the same. I do this in the app every day or two. (Once a week or so i open the desktop version and do a proper reconcile.)
So I basically only use Red flag. Red for WTF is this charge?! I use emoji's for more customized notations. Not as helpful when using the search but I think a combination of the two is probably top notch. I'm also wondering WHEN more colors would be made available. We love colors. Give me Lisa Frank all day long baby! And sparkles. lol
I use red flag for everything I schedule. Then when I pay something I turn it green. When incomeTBB comes in it turns blue. I use yellow on my credit card accounts to signify interest added. I use purple and orange for things I need to remember to do something special about. Pretty simple but it works for me.
I have a "CASH" account and use flags to sort whether it's actual cash or whether I'm using an app like CashApp, Venmo, Paypal, or ApplePay (yeah... my friends/family all use different ones)
I use flags when reconciling because sometimes I put things on a different credit card than I entered in YNAB so when it doesn't match my bank transactions I know to check for it when reconciling other accounts (none of my accounts are linked)
Whenever I buy something using a dollars (I am not from the US) the value changes depending on the current exchange rate. At the end of the month when the credit card statement closes the value is final and I can easily check and correct, then remove the flag.
I set a red flag to indicate the the bank SEES the transaction, but it has not cleared yet. Reconciling is much easier. My bank sends me a notification on ANY transaction which tells me to set the red flag :-).
All upcoming transactions are flagged in red. As I'm sure their category has enough money I switch to green. Hopefully I can retire that when I get a little further ahead.
Oooh! That's brilliant and such good preventative/forward thinking! I'm gonna bet your flag system is exactly the thing that finally *gets* you ahead. You're doin' it right, girl! Cheering ya on!! -Hannah :)
YES please. There are a lot of us that have small home based businesses, or are in a multi-level Marketing business (Avon, Mary Kay, Tuperware, etc...). I have struggled with how to separate these in my budget, because I use my personal credit card for purchases for the business, and receive payments by a variety of ways (cash, etransfer, paypal, etc...). I do not want to get a separate credit card just for my business. I have created a separate budged for my business, but am struggling with how to keep track of my spending, especially since I am my own best client (I purchase a lot of products for personal use).
The flags do not show on my budget page. I can find them on the menu option to edit flags with a name for that color, but they are not on the actual budget page for me to utilize. I have asked for tech support.
Hey there! Flags don't actually exist out in the budget, they live in the "Accounts" tab. In the mobile app, click the "Accounts" tab at the bottom, select the account, and tap any transaction-you can add a flag on this transaction-editing screen. Once you save and head back to that account, you'll see the flag indicated by a colored dot to the right of the transaction under the "cleared" symbol. In the web app, click an account on the lefthand side of the screen (or click "All Accounts" to see all transactions across all accounts in one place), and you can add and edit flags on the left end of each transaction. From here, you can easily search by flags using the search bar, as well! 🌻 Hannah
I use flags for marking upcoming bill pay payments that have already been scheduled. Yellow means the payment has been scheduled at the bank, green means it's been budgeted in YNAB AND scheduled at the bank, and blue means it's been budgeted in YNAB only. But here's my question: Why does it jump to the top of my scheduled transactions when I put any flags on them? Then I don't have the transactions in the correct date position and I have caught myself entering two transactions in my scheduled ones by mistake. Any way to just flag it and keep it where it belongs chronologically? Thanks.
I use green flags to indicated that it matches what I'm seeing in my bank account, and yellow for when I need to reconcile. If there is a expense no flagged green, I know to do more research.
This would be a super helpful feature. Otherwise, you just have to remember what the colors mean. And that can be tricky when two people are sharing the budget!
Apparently, you can change the names using the browser extension YNAB Toolkit, but the names don't carry over to other browsers, computers, or to the app.
I use flags to keep track of all of my online purchases. Everything I've ordered stays purple until I receive it so I can make sure nothing gets lost in the mail!
Well this is brilliant, Shelley! Good tip!
This episode reminds me of Sheldon Cooper's "Fun With Flags."
I was thinking the same! Imagine him as a YNAB guest. I feel like Mayim Bialik who played Amy would be all about this!
W
Definitely lol
😂
Ha ha! Me too!
Attention all beautiful YNABers! As of today, you can now assign flags in bulk! To do so, simply select allllllll the transactions you want to flag with a particular color, click the "Edit" menu, hover over "Flag," and select the flag color you want to assign! Easy as peasy. I mean pie. Easy as peasy pie. Okay. Happy budgeting! -Hannah :)
I use a purple flag to flag transactions that I need to claim back on my tax return at the end of the financial year. Come tax time, I simply use the search bar to look for purple-flagged transactions over the last year. I also leave the flags on these transactions permanently for future reference. It makes my life super easy. 😊
I do the same thing!
As I was watching the video, tax-deductible expenses were the first thing that popped in my mind. #greatminds
That is genius. Thank you for sharing!
I do like flags but find the implementation very limiting and hope YNAB expands on it in the future. First off, there are only 6 of them. Secondly, the fact that they are just colors with no editable name, means I essentially need to keep a "key" handy so I know what flag is what. Then because there are only 6 of them it means that I often share colors for short term and long term, making my "key" even more complex. I really wish I could just create/delete flags as desired, with a chosen color AND a short name.
For the desktop version, the toolkit lets you give names to your flags, but they won’t show up in the app
My wife and I used flags to communicate with each other thru YNAB. Particularly, when we din't know what a particular charge the other had made on credit card was for. I just flagged them blue to indicate to her, I didn't know what it was for (and guessed the category to use).. When she would see the blue flag, she would categorize it properly, if required, and then tell me in the memo what it was for, and change the flag to purple which equalled "resolved". Was a great system for us.
Niiiice! I love that. And, lemme tell you, you're gonna love a little update we have coming to flags real soon here... 😏
🌻 Hannah
@@YNABofficial What was the update??
I use a specific flag color to indicate all charitable donations. Makes it super easy at tax time to filter for the flag color and see all of my donations in one fell swoop.
This is a great idea, and I am going to immediately steal it lol ^_^
😂
-Hannah :)
I would use the flags way more if we could name them because I have a terrible memory! I know the Toolkit allows me to name them, but it seems to clear or reset every now and then so I just stopped using them. Amazing update idea for YNAB!!!
Also Wanted to ask if I could name my flags
I will definitely take this back to the crew! Thanks for sharing your ideas!!
-Hannah :)
She was just born to be on camera. The. Best.
I use an orange flag when I make an online purchase and clear it when the item arrives so I don't pay for it until I know it has been received.
OMG!!!! Great idea. Going to do that RIGHT NOW!!!
The 8 tips covered in this video:
Long Term Flag Uses:
Track trends (responsible spending vs impulse buying)
Track events (ie: moving costs)
Track reimbursements (Different color per step in reimbursement process)
Separate irregular purchases from typical budget activity (ie: car buying)
Debt paydown awareness (all debt payments flagged one color)
Short Term Flag Uses:
Uncertain category (partner's transaction)
Reminder to split transaction later
Uncleared checks
Please give us more colours!
I never even paid attention to the flag option before. Thanks, Hannah! Once again, you have shown me things I could do with YNAB that I didn’t even know I wanted to do.
I have some 1099 income, and I flag any purchases that are tax deductible. That way I don’t have to go hunting through my credit card statements at tax time!
Fernanda - Approximately Right Great idea!
That’s what i do too!
I use a category for that.
I use a flag for repeating payments that I don’t know the real value, e.g. my electricity bill is scheduled for $xxx every month , but the actual amount varies each month. So a yellow flag means “I need to check the amount”
Blue=Bills
Yellow=Weekly Expenses (gas, groceries, Starbucks...)
Green=Savings
Orange=Savings/Sinking Funds Spending
Red=Income
Purple=Personal Allowance (Makeup, skincare, hair care)
Similar to the short term reasons you mentioned, I use flags when the amount I've spent is uncertain and I'll need to correct it later. For example, I went shopping and didn't get a paper reciept, and I know I spent aaaabout £15 but I can't remember how much exactly. That's fine, stick in a £15 transaction with a red flag, come back once it shows up on my bank statement and make it more precise. Another example, I bought something on the internet in another currency. I know my bank will charge a small currency exchange fee but I don't know how much. Put in a transaction, red flag, refer to bank statement and correct later!
Also, hi YNAB video team, these videos are fantastic as always, very easy to watch and very very helpful! Thank you!! Keep it up!
I flag my online shopping purchases so I remember to watch for that item to arrive at my house 😊
You are so funny! Just another reason I love YNAB! I use flags for some tax deductible expenses, like daycare - or business expenses for our side hustle catering business. :)
If flags have been used in the past and we want to "clear all", say for a new idea for use - can we have an option to clear all historical flags?
We just recently tried the flags. We mark them for each car and for our own spending. So if we get gas in one car, we mark it yellow and the other car is blue. That way we can look back at how much gas each car used and keep them all within the "Fuel" category. Same for our coffee category. If my husband buys it or if I do, we each have our own color. But I agree with the others. I wish there were a key to remember what each flag is for!!
I love the idea of flags! If I were to make a suggestion, I think it would be helpful if there was a line at the bottom where you could create your own flag “key”, to help remember what each flag indicates. Still in my trial month but loving YNAB so far!
Girl, you are hilarious! You make watching budgeting videos something to look forward to EVERY day!! =)
Thank you, Lara!! So glad to be here and be able to share with y'all!!
-Hannah :)
Whenever I purchase something in a foreign currency, it hits my bank account straight away as one amount, by when it finally clears days later, the amount is finalised and currency exchange being what it is, the number is different. Before I realised this, it REALLY messed with my reconciliations because a number previously reconciled had now changed.
So I flag it. Then when I get the final updated amount, I update the line entry and remove the flag.
I use mine for different members of the family. Any supplies, activities, gifts, clothing for my 4 year old gets marked as blue. My baby gets green for anything for him, etc.
I occasionally use red flags for scheduled renewals (annual or monthly subscriptions) that I may want to cancel before the renewal date. I apply an earlier date to the scheduled transaction so it appears like a reminder, before the actual payment date (the actual payment date can be noted in the memo field). 🙂🚩🛑💰
Oh, I love that! So smart!
🌻 Hannah
Love me some flags, Hannah! I have an online business and use one YNAB budget for both personal and business transactions. I use flags for the business transactions. So GREEN is for income, RED is for expenses and PURPLE is for home office expenses (like internet, utilities, rent, etc.). Then at tax time I export my YNAB budget and delete all line items that don't have flags and boom, there's my taxes half done! Thanks for the vid as always :)
That's very cool. I like how easy you made that. However I recommend you get different accounts for personal vs business. If you ever get audited, you'll be so glad they don't want to look through everything. It also means you have all income and expenses already in one place. You still have a pull a report on home expenses but you are already doing that.
Love the comparison of flags as post it notes! I have one single person who insists on a physical check payment each month instead of an electronic payment. Consequently, I spend 3-4 weeks waiting for this person to cash the check so it can clear the bank. I always flag this transaction in red to remind me why it hasn’t cleared. Love these videos!
Oh my word, Kelly-stressful!! When I first started babysitting in junior high, I once waited six months before I cashed a check because I didn't really understand why that would be an issue. When I handed the check to the teller and she saw the date, her eyes grew to the size of Jupiter 😂 Then I got a slight-but-kind talking to, and now I cash checks same/next day. Oh, the lessons of our youth!
-Hannah :)
I use quite a few flags. Red is normally a place holder and should be deleted. Blue are scheduled through automatic payment systems. Orange needs more information such as splits or details from spouse. Purple are automatic payments that will likely fail and need to be reconfigured. Yellow are prepurchases where the product will arrive at a later date. Honestly, I don't know if I could function without the flags. lol
Love that! Flags are a Jim's best friend :)
-Hannah :)
Another enlightening Hannah video!! ❣ I did not know about flags... I now know how to dress up my transactions with a bit of flag-bling-blink 🚩
🚩 😎 👑
-Hannah :)
This is super useful! I've been using YNAB for years and never used the flags feature. From now on I'm definitely going to use it when I've asked for a refund for something and then when the refund arrives. And I'll use it when I need to ask my husband in which category a transaction belongs. So far I've been putting '???' in the Notes space whenever I needed to ask him, but a flag is prettier :)
I do the same thing! Those ??? drive me nuts!
Hannah, your videos make me so happy and make budgeting so much more accessible to me emotionally because of the light-hearted way that you approach this topic. I
Frankie!! What in the world?! You are so kind!! I'm so glad to be here and if all I ever accomplish in life is that I made budgeting slightly less intimidating and a little more fun, I'll consider it a win 😊 Glad to have you here!!
-Hannah :)
You can also change the name of a flag color to specifically identify the transactions without having to remember which color means what.
@broink99 Thanks for mentioning that flags can be renamed. I didn't know that. 🙂
Super helpful, Thank you.
I use tags to keep with purchases made on my credit card. All purchases made between payoffs are assigned a color so I know exactly what the lump payment on the card covered
I've suggested this through the app in the past but it would be useful to be able to select multiple entries and flag them all as the same color. Right now when I have a bunch of transactions it is a pain to go through every single one and flag it. Hopefully it can happen one day!
This was posted in the feed: Attention all beautiful YNABers! As of today, you can now assign flags in bulk! To do so, simply select allllllll the transactions you want to flag with a particular color, click the "Edit" menu, hover over "Flag," and select the flag color you want to assign! Easy as peasy. I mean pie. Easy as peasy pie. Okay. Happy budgeting! -Hannah :)
I work at a grocery store, so I often grab a snack or my lunch on break, and this gets lumped into the grocery category. I'm trying to do this less though, so everytime I buy something for immediate consumption at work, it gets red flagged. It helps me track those uber specific impulsebuys
Yes!! So smart! You know yourself, so make your budget work for you. Best of luck on breaking that habit! I know those are so, so hard to leave behind!
-Hannah 🌻
These videos are so great! Informative and amusing, well done! Keep up the great job 😁😂😂😂😁
Thank you, Tom!! As long as people are wanting budgeting to be a little more loose, fun, and carefree, I'll be here :)
-Hannah :)
I just used flags when reconciling an account to mark it as "maybe in the wrong account." Then I could easily find it in the "all accounts" list of transactions and see if it matched anything in another account, at which point I could delete it or remove the flag.
I use flags whenever I buy flags
I use flags to mark transactions that get paid from our fun money accounts. I search by the flag color, select all, and YNAB tells me how much to pay the credit card from the fun money accounts. When I pay, I switch the flag to a different color. I use our school colors so I know whose is whose.
I started using flags last year as a way to know what expenses are for work, family, kids only, personal and couple. It was chocking when I saw all expenses related to "personal" and "work", usually they are hidden under other categories (snacks, groceries, etc), but not anymore. Thanks for this video!!! 😉
Whee! Time to join in the flagging fun! I flag transactions based on the type of receipt I've validated the transaction against. Yellow for paper receipt, orange for digital receipt, blue for no receipt (vending machines, I'm looking at you!) and red for OMGWHEREISTHERECEIPT? Green for income, purple for transfers. All part of the reconciliation process!
Also, thanks Hannah! I asked for multi-transaction flagging months ago! Excited!
Yes! A long requested feature and we're so excited to finally release it to the wild! Thanks for sharing your tips and work flow! Always appreciated.
-Hannah 🌻
Like always, you get the point across and make us have fun while you do it. Great work, Hannah!
i use flags to indicate my auto-pays, transfers between accounts and cash that needs to be pulled. the colors correspond with my paper planner budget so I can keep everything organized. this was a great video btw.
I flag all tax-deductible expenses, they are in different categories, so flags give me a great overview at the end of the year :)
I am pretty simple with my flags; red is for a pending transaction and blue is for when it has cleared my account and if I have to make an adjustment due to it it not reconciling I flag it orange. I do like the idea of short term flags and may use some she mentioned. Love your videos Hannah!
How fun would it be to have a rainbow budget?! Glad you're finding the videos helpful!! Keep it up!
-Hannah :)
I use flags to identify who did the spending.
One color for me, and another for her. It's easier to recall why we spent on that, or to blame impulse purchases. 😜
Hey now, THAT'S a brilliant one I hadn't thought of! Definitely helps with clarity and assigning categorizing responsibilities within the budget. I love that! Thanks so much for sharing!!
-Hannah :)
That is a great idea. I can already tell you I will be sad to see the result.
I have never shared a comment about YNAB but now watching this video I can tell that YNAB is an Essential tool to really keep control of your money and educate oneself of the money habits we have. I have used consistently since 2019 and this have really make a difference in my life about how I manage my money for good. Great Great tool.
thanks so much! I have never used a flag until today, but I am off to start tracking my good purchases, bad purchases and purchases to be considered :) THANK YOU
Same! I had never used flags before making this video (we all gotta start somewhere, yeah?!) and now I'm tracking money well spent with orange (my favorite color), unnecessary spending with yellow (because I don't like red, and yellow means "yield" or "slow down"), and student loan payments with green (because 🤑🤮). We're twins!
-Hannah :)
I'm new to YNAB and just setting up my budget. I can already see a great use for flags. We are trying to prune our spending and in looking at our bank statements over the past few months, I see subscriptions that we need to cancel to get our budget in shape. Flagging will be a great way to remind me to make sure those expenses get cancelled.
Yes!! And fun fact-coming soon to a budget near you: flag *labels*. Soon enough you'll be able to name your purple flags "Cancel me!" and your yellow flags "Work reimbursements!"
🌻 Hannah
Great video 🚩 I use flags on my recurring transactions so they stand out compared to daily transactions (software business subscriptions - orange / any fees that I could avoid otherwise with better budgeting - red).
Oh Hannah you have become a part of my sunshiny day. Please keep up the good work and know you have a fan in me! Love the content and for making budgeting cool!
You are so sweet!! I'm so glad I caught this comment! Glad to be here and LOVE my job. :)
-Hannah :)
I use flags in my spend (checking) account to keep track of which monthly payments are automatically deducted and which I have to actually REMEMBER to pay! Red ones stay red all the time, month after month. For the manually-paid bills, I add a green flag. Once reconciled, I go to the top of the list and remove the green flag for that same upcoming bill for the following month. This lets me keep track of which of those few manually-paid monthly bills I have already paid and which I haven't. (Looking back, the colors don't seem to fit, but hey, it's been working for me for several years now lol).
Please figure out how to make a key for the flags. Pretty please
+1 One of the reasons I hardly ever use flags is I fear I'll forget what each flag means.
I think they are vague so you can individualize it for your own needs. 🙂
@@stevewright3940 Write it somewhere and you'll never forget it.
I use an orange flag when I'm reconciling my credit card if a transaction is pending. I also use flags in my "scheduled transactions". I use a "yellow flag" when I have updated the correct amount of an upcoming bill. And I change it to a "green flag" when I have scheduled a payment for that bill on Bill Pay. That way I know that it has been set up on payment for a future date, and I don't need to worry about it.
This came at the perfect time. I didn't stop to enter the transaction, I know kinda how much I spent but not exactly, the receipt could be anywhere, and it hasn't hit my bank account yet. Red flag it is!
HA! "The receipt could be anywhere" is a sentence I greatly identify with 😂 Brilliant! Flag away!!
-Hannah :)
We have to make a certain amount of debit card swipes with our CU account so we flag them and counting them is easier. Also, I use a flag when I enter a transaction with a temporary amount cause sometimes I don't take a receipt and I promptly forget the precise total.
Whoa! I've never heard of a minimum swipe count before! But that's really smart-filter out your transactions to only show those flags, count em up, and then meet your end of the month quota. Love that.
And same with me and forgetting! I can't tell you how many times they tell me the total, I repeat it all the way back to my seat or my car, then have no idea what it was despite how intentional I tried to be about it. Reminds me of this scene from Boy Meets World 😂
th-cam.com/video/ZDJJWHcjylY/w-d-xo.html
-Hannah :)
@@YNABofficial we get 2% Interest but stipulations include 12 debit card charges and direct deposit :)
I'm glad I'm not the only one who forgets!
I use flags for transactions completed over venmo. This is helpful because I typically reconcile my account balances by looking at my online bank or credit card statements, however, venmo transactions just show up as "venmo" on my checking account with no further information. Also, if the venmo balance isn't sent to the back quickly enough the actual venmo->checking account transactions may actually reflect multiple venmo transactions. I want to make sure all venmo transactions (paying someone for eating out, which should be properly categorized as eating out, for example) are properly categorized. The flag indicates the fact that venmo transactions require a little more care with bookkeeping.
Even after this (great) video I still was unsure what flags could do for me, but I love the suggestions people leave here in the comments! The ones I liked most were about this: flag stuff you think could have been avoided. It can be done with just a red flag or more nuanced like with red, orange, and yellow. Then every year you can see if that gives room for improvement. It is nice to have this 'meta-system' on top of the categories.
The shimmy at "it's all good" had me LOL! Thanks for the video, Hannah! You're awesome!
Always dancing! Even over categorizing transactions! Dare I say *especially* over categorizing transactions. 💃🏻
-Hannah :)
I like to use one color flag to mark the last transaction which cleared the bank when I reconciled last. (Purple - fave color). I also like to use Orange for any follow up necessary (mostly checking split transaction amounts). I also use Red to mean something is wrong and I need to look into it further.
Love the idea of the last reconciled transaction!
Love it! Had no idea flags were so useful in YNAB - I’m gonna go add some to my budget now 😀
Right?! Gonna be honest, neither did I 😂 Now I'm tracking necessary vs unnecessary spending as well as debt payment contributions (student loans, I'm comin' for ya!).
-Hannah :)
I flag imported pending transactions where I gave a tip (restaurants) because usually the tip wont show until after its processed.
Yes! Smart! This happens all the time at my favorite coffee shop.
-Hannah 🌻
I use flags to indicate scheduled transactions that I have to actually manually pay, as most of my transactions are auto drafted.
This is helpful. I never used flags before in my budget but this has given me some ideas!!
Ahh, we love ideas... 😏 😏 😏
-Hannah :)
I use flags all the time to show category spending trends. I would love more colors though and the option to flag each category in a split transaction. That would be very helpful for me.
I don't understand what you mean. Is this different from the reports you can pull detailing what you spent in each category over X amount of time?
neonnn123 I like being able to see my spending trends in my transaction list by account (not necessarily all my accounts combined). I can see at a glance the places I’m spending at as well as the categories all at once. The reports are good for the big picture (although I wish I could reassign the category colors to match my flags) but for the at a glance or more detailed pictures of my trends they don’t work for me.
I use the red green (and yellow) flag method at the end of the month to think through my transactions and reflect.
Reflection! Love that. Any active practice with my budget that increases the awareness of my spending is so, so good to motivate change and better habits. Awesome idea!
-Hannah :)
I use flags as a color coding system for the type of transaction that entry is. Red is money leaving the budget, green is money coming in, orange is paying debt, blue is credit to a credit line, yellow is transfers of money from one asset account to another, and purple is created debt. For anything specific I need to note about a transaction I make liberal and flagrant use of the memo line.
I just leave those on the entries permanently, so I'm a long-term flagger. :)
Lots of great ideas in the video too!
I love to color code my transactions but I wish YNAB had more colors to it... Why aren't there more colors?
Yeah more colors would be amazing
I flag foreign transactions, sometimes the amount changes after the bank clears the transactions which is a pain while reconciliation.
We use flags for spending that can be itemized for taxes.
I use flags to track our respective car expenses. So blue for his car, purple for mine. That way we can see which car is costing us how much in repairs/maintenance and gas. Short term for something I need to pay attention to.
Brilliant! I think the best part of that is being able to look up either flag color and pull up ALL the expenses that specific car has incurred in it's lifetime-so handy.
-Hannah :)
@@YNABofficial Yes! Exactly! Also, geeking out a little that THE Hannah replied to my comment! 🤩
Ha! Actually we just hired 12 different Hannahs and they all respond to everyone's comments on behalf of me... I mean, on behalf of her.
-Hannah :)
^ Silly Hannah #7. Always got her foot in her mouth.
-Hannah :)
Thanks for the ideas!!! My family use purple flag for technique #6 just to remind us that we need to review that transaction that showed up in our credit card and split/categorize it properly. green flags indicate recurrent payments that I don't have to worry about, like internet, mobile phone service and etc. I like the suggestion of flagging reimbursement transactions!
Renaming flags was one of the top feature requests in YNAB4. What could be the possible reasons it was not done already?
I read it's considered but newer actual explanation why it's not already done (not even "our houses would be burned down and cat peed on by rival gang").
It won't work for the mobile interface, but you can rename the flags if you use the YNAB Toolkit: chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/toolkit-for-ynab/lmhdkkhepllpnondndgpgclfjnlofgjl?hl=en
I have to keep a paper note on my desk to remind me of the meaning of the flags I am using. The ability to name flags seems so simple, I am surprised it has not been implemented.
@@derekcassells8341 if you're not using the YNAB toolkit I highly recommend it. It has a lot of features that, IMO, really should be part of the standard package
Is there a way to label the flags so that my husband and I can know what the colors mean to us?
Currently, there is not. Feel free to reach out to support with that feature request!! We're always looking for customer feedback on how to improve!
-Hannah 🌻
I was wondering this too. A place to create a key for the colors!
Now you can with the new update!
@@keilanovoa wow, thanks so much for seeing this and letting me know!
I have to say it again - I LOVE YOUR VIDEOS! LOVE EM! I didn't even know there were flags..... and I just marked 3 things before the video ended.
Hanna hiding behind desk waving flag.
Me: *hit like*
😂😂😂
🌻Hannah
Blue: a transaction I entered in the moment so I know it is categorized correctly but I didn't keep the receipt, like groceries or fast food.
Green: a transaction I entered in the moment and I am keeping the receipt, for tax or reimbursement purposes.
Gray - means the transaction was added by import and I need to check it and make sure it's legit/properly categorized. Once I check it I mark it blue or green depending on if I have a receipt or not. That way I don't have to wonder or go looking for a receipt I'm never going to find.
Red: something needs fixing.
Yellow: scheduled transactions I entered ahead of time but that may or may not be correct. Mostly used for easily entering my paychecks with all my regular splits each month.
I flag scheduled transactions red if the dollar value needs to be checked and perhaps updated.
I use green flags in the app to indicate a ‘soft reconcile’. Tells me that up to this transaction ynab accounts and bank accounts are the same. I do this in the app every day or two. (Once a week or so i open the desktop version and do a proper reconcile.)
So I basically only use Red flag. Red for WTF is this charge?!
I use emoji's for more customized notations. Not as helpful when using the search but I think a combination of the two is probably top notch.
I'm also wondering WHEN more colors would be made available. We love colors. Give me Lisa Frank all day long baby! And sparkles. lol
I use red flag for everything I schedule. Then when I pay something I turn it green. When incomeTBB comes in it turns blue. I use yellow on my credit card accounts to signify interest added. I use purple and orange for things I need to remember to do something special about. Pretty simple but it works for me.
I have a "CASH" account and use flags to sort whether it's actual cash or whether I'm using an app like CashApp, Venmo, Paypal, or ApplePay (yeah... my friends/family all use different ones)
I've never seen such improvement in any TH-cam channel. The videos from 5,6 years ago were. ...unpolished😊
🥰 🥰 🥰
-Hannah :)
I have used flags for things that are a "need" that pop up. For example any unplanned items in relation to Covid.
I use flags when reconciling because sometimes I put things on a different credit card than I entered in YNAB so when it doesn't match my bank transactions I know to check for it when reconciling other accounts (none of my accounts are linked)
Whenever I buy something using a dollars (I am not from the US) the value changes depending on the current exchange rate. At the end of the month when the credit card statement closes the value is final and I can easily check and correct, then remove the flag.
Oh wow! I've never dealt with multiple currencies before, but that's a smart use of flags, to be sure!
🌻 Hannah
I haven’t used flags previously but think they’d be really useful to flag transactions I’m expecting a refund on
D’oh, now this newbie wants to flag but can’t come up with an idea that works for my budget! Well, maybe I will later.
I set a red flag to indicate the the bank SEES the transaction, but it has not cleared yet. Reconciling is much easier. My bank sends me a notification on ANY transaction which tells me to set the red flag :-).
All upcoming transactions are flagged in red. As I'm sure their category has enough money I switch to green. Hopefully I can retire that when I get a little further ahead.
Oooh! That's brilliant and such good preventative/forward thinking! I'm gonna bet your flag system is exactly the thing that finally *gets* you ahead. You're doin' it right, girl! Cheering ya on!!
-Hannah :)
This is such a good idea Christie ! Thanks for the tip, I'm going to do it immediatly !
I like your videos. You are so cool :D
I would like to have more colors to expand the flag options. Dont you think that 6 is too few? :(
Using ynab in a business would be a good video
Ahh, Martin-the idea machine is exploding... 😏
-Hannah :)
YES please. There are a lot of us that have small home based businesses, or are in a multi-level Marketing business (Avon, Mary Kay, Tuperware, etc...). I have struggled with how to separate these in my budget, because I use my personal credit card for purchases for the business, and receive payments by a variety of ways (cash, etransfer, paypal, etc...). I do not want to get a separate credit card just for my business. I have created a separate budged for my business, but am struggling with how to keep track of my spending, especially since I am my own best client (I purchase a lot of products for personal use).
Blouse Barn! 😂
Just wanted to say Hi Hannah :)
Haha--I haven't seen your videos before. Really entertaining and helpful! So charming.
I like this. Maybe I’ll use this, this month to see really where my money goes. 😂
😂 🙋🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️
The flags do not show on my budget page. I can find them on the menu option to edit flags with a name for that color, but they are not on the actual budget page for me to utilize. I have asked for tech support.
Hey there! Flags don't actually exist out in the budget, they live in the "Accounts" tab.
In the mobile app, click the "Accounts" tab at the bottom, select the account, and tap any transaction-you can add a flag on this transaction-editing screen. Once you save and head back to that account, you'll see the flag indicated by a colored dot to the right of the transaction under the "cleared" symbol.
In the web app, click an account on the lefthand side of the screen (or click "All Accounts" to see all transactions across all accounts in one place), and you can add and edit flags on the left end of each transaction.
From here, you can easily search by flags using the search bar, as well!
🌻 Hannah
I use flags for marking upcoming bill pay payments that have already been scheduled. Yellow means the payment has been scheduled at the bank, green means it's been budgeted in YNAB AND scheduled at the bank, and blue means it's been budgeted in YNAB only. But here's my question: Why does it jump to the top of my scheduled transactions when I put any flags on them? Then I don't have the transactions in the correct date position and I have caught myself entering two transactions in my scheduled ones by mistake. Any way to just flag it and keep it where it belongs chronologically? Thanks.
Click the date column and sort by date instead of by flag!
I use green flags to indicated that it matches what I'm seeing in my bank account, and yellow for when I need to reconcile. If there is a expense no flagged green, I know to do more research.
Great video! Can you name the flags?
This would be a super helpful feature. Otherwise, you just have to remember what the colors mean. And that can be tricky when two people are sharing the budget!
You can with the Toolkit :)
Apparently, you can change the names using the browser extension YNAB Toolkit, but the names don't carry over to other browsers, computers, or to the app.
Not currently, but note taken! Lemme share that with the team :)
-Hannah :)