Categorizing your transactions

Keeping your transactions categorized helps you to understand your earning & spending and track your budgets.

You can manually categorize your transactions on the Transactions page or on the Categorize items page. You can also set up Category Rules to let PocketSmith do the heavy lifting 💪🏽 for you. This means less time spent manually categorizing your transactions - yay ⏱!

Filters allow even more control than category rules over how your transactions are categorized. You can use Filters to automatically assign categories as well as make other edits like re-naming complicated Merchant names, adding labels and marking transactions as transfers.

You can also choose to have your transactions automatically categorized from the bank feed if your accounts are linked to bank feeds. Some people like to use a combination of automatic categorization from the bank feed, along with their own category rules.

Just getting started?

Using category rules is a great way to categorize the bulk of your transactions, but it's best to check out our user guide - The different ways to categorize your transactions - to see all the options and find a way that works for you✨

Quick Answers

Why do I need to categorize my transactions?

It’s important to categorize your transactions so that you can track your earning and spending across different areas and create budgets.

Once your transactions are categorized you’ll be able to use PocketSmith to easily see where your money is coming from, and where it’s going, allowing you to make informed choices and budget accordingly!

Why do categories I've not created keep re-appearing?

If you notice categories keep reappearing that you did not add, this is likely due to bank feed automatic categorization. The option Auto-categorize where possible is selected by default when you first add your bank feeds. This results in new categories being made for you when new transactions are imported.

You can either turn this setting off, delete the bank feed category or edit the bank feed category name to one you’d prefer and PocketSmith will remember this for next time.

How do I assign categories to my transactions?

There are a few different ways that you can categorize your transactions within PocketSmith. We’ve got all the details in our user guide: The different ways to categorize your transactions

Can PocketSmith remember and automatically categorize similar transactions?

Yes! You can set up category rules so that PocketSmith automatically categorizes your transactions and you won’t have to. Check out: Using Category Rules to automatically categorize transactions

Is it possible to have PocketSmith automatically categorize transactions based on an amount as well as the merchant name?

Yes! If you need to categorize a transaction based on multiple criteria (eg. amount, merchant, account, date) you can do this using a filter.

Unlike category rules, a filter lets you set multiple parameters to isolate a group of transactions, which you can then categorize, or even apply multiple changes to. To learn how to set up Filters please see our user guide: Everything you need to know about filters

I'm using the automatic categorization by the bank feed feature, but there are some transactions that I'd prefer to assign to different categories. I don't want to set up category rules or filters to do this for me, I'd rather leave them uncategorized so I can assign these manually, is this possible?

Yes, this is possible! If you've noticed some of your transactions are being incorrectly categorized by automatic categorization from the bank feed and you'd rather categorize them manually, you can create a filter to uncategorize these transactions for you.

When creating a filter, you'll just need to choose the 'No category' option in the Assign category field. Choosing this option means you can isolate particular transactions that are automatically categorized by the bank feed, to be uncategorized. This way, you can categorize them manually, when you are ready. To learn how to create Filters please see: Everything you need to know about filters