The Spending feature in your mobile app has been designed to help you understand where your money goes each month, to give you insights into your day-to-day spending, and help you to budget.
Once you have set up Spending, you will be presented with the following tabs:
- Categories - An automatic breakdown of your transactions into categories that you can re-categorise at any time to further personalise your Spending feature.
- Insights - A selection of useful insights into your day-to-day spending
- Budgets - An option to set and manage budgets against the above categories.
These three areas will help you to keep track of your finances.
Note: All transactions made before sub-categories were introduced are categorised into 'Other' within each parent category. E.g. your coffee shop purchase would go into 'Eating out'- 'Other'.
Can I use Spending?
You can use Spending providing you are over the age of 16, hold a personal or premier account with us, and use our mobile app.
You will need to be registered with Online Banking, have a compatible iOS or Android device, and a UK mobile number (or an international number in specific countries).
How do I set up Spending?
To set up Spending, just open up your mobile app and follow these instructions:
- Tap Spending from the menu in the mobile app to open it up.
- Tap 'let's go'.
- Select which of your bank accounts or credit cards you'd like to include in your Spending view.
- Choose the date you'd like your month to start (for example, your payday).
- Finally, help us understand which categories you'd like certain transactions to appear in.
Why do I need to set a date when setting up Spending?
When initially setting up Spending, you will be asked to set a start date for your month. This will give you a personalised view of your money based on how you manage your finances, and assist if you wish to set monthly budgets. The default start date will be a calendar month view, but you may wish to set this date as your payday, for example.
You can amend this date at any time from the settings menu, found in the top right corner of the Spending section of your app.
Which of my bank accounts will I see in Spending?
You will be able to see all of your personal current accounts in Spending, as well as any joint accounts, savings accounts and credit cards. Transactions you undertake on business accounts or any accounts with other banks are not currently included. We are working to add other types of accounts and transactions in the future.
If you have multiple accounts, you can select which of these you want to see by selecting or de-selecting them in the Spending settings section. By including all of the accounts you use, this will give you the fullest view of your spending overall.
How does Spending work with joint accounts?
Any transactions made on a joint account, regardless of who is spending, will be included in your Spending view. If you are an additional card holder on a credit card account, only the main account holder will see transactions in Spending. Transactions made by your joint party on their own personal accounts will not be included.
Your joint party will not have access to any of your personalisation, re-categorisation, budget setting or insights.
How far back will I see when I use Spending?
In Spending, you will be able to see a rolling 12 month period view of all of your personal current account spending. As other account types are added in future, data may only be available from the day a new account is added.
Can I make payments using Spending
The option to make payments between your accounts or to third parties is available from the home screen of your mobile app as normal, but is not available from within the Spending tab.
Will I see my pending transactions in Spending?
All of the transactions you see in Spending will be exactly the same as you are used to in your mobile app, with both pending and posted transactions being included.
You will not be able to change the category of a pending transaction until it is fully cleared in your account.
Do I have to use Spending?
You don't have to use the Spending feature in your mobile app. Everything else in the mobile app will still work the same as it does now if you choose to use it or not.
Spending will always be there for you, should you choose to use it in the future.
Can I access Spending on multiple devices?
The Spending feature is currently only available in your mobile app, but can be used on different devices.
Spending will appear the same on all of the devices that you use the app on, including any budgets you may have set. You would need to log out and then log back in to your devices in order to show any changes made.
Can anyone else view the information held within my Spending feature in my app?
The information in Spending is only available to you. This means no one else, including joint parties or members of bank staff, will have sight of your Spending insights, the categorisation of your transactions, which accounts you have included in your view, your chosen start of month date, or any budgets you may have set, and your performance against them.
How do budgets work?
You can set a budget against any of the listed categories. All budgets are set on a rolling monthly period, but you can amend the date this starts in the settings section of the Spending tab within the mobile app.
Feel free to check your progress against budgets at any point throughout the month, using your Insights or Budgets tabs. When your budgeting month ends, your summary for that month will be available at the bottom of the Budgets tab. A summary of any months prior to this will not be available to view.
All budgets you set are for your personal use and monitoring only. They will not affect your ability to obtain credit, nor will they stop your debit card from working if you go over budget.