Starting Fresh
This guide helps you with the first steps you’ll have to take after creating your monetr login. You’ll have the option to connect your bank account to monetr via our partner Plaid, or you can create a manual budget that will let you manage your finances directly or via a convienent file upload.
monetr refers to these as “links”, as in a link between monetr and your bank or a “manual link/budget”. There are some diferences in how the Plaid links and manual links work once you have them setup.
| Feature | Plaid | Manual |
|---|---|---|
| Automated Updates | Yes | No |
| Create Custom Transactions | No | Yes |
| Edit Transaction Details | (Only Names) | Yes |
| Import Data From File | No | Yes |
These features are subject to change over time, especially as monetr nears its v1.0 release.
Link Accounts
Plaid can be the easiest way for most people to manage their data, it requires little to no effort to get the information you need to create your budget into monetr.
monetr cannot move any funds in your actual bank account via Plaid. monetr receives read-only access to data like transactions and balances. This data is exclusively used to help you create your budget.
You can find out more in our Privacy Policy
Select Plaid and click Continue to begin the connection process. After a moment you should see the following screen:
Plaid will guide you through the process of authenticating your accounts. After you have finished you will be redirected to the account’s page in monetr and you can begin creating your budget!
Note: It is best to connect monetr to the account you primarily use for spending. monetr does allow multiple connections if you use multiple bank accounts.
Manual Accounts
If you would prefer to manage your budget manually, monetr provides a process to setup a manual budget. Select Manual and click Continue.
Name Your Budget
Specify a name for the bank or budget that you are creating.
Your First Account
Name the account for your budget, this is intended to be 1:1 with an actual checking account in order to keep things simple.
Starting Balance
You can specify the starting or current balance for the account if you want. Note: If you import data via a file upload after this, then the balance will be overwritten.
Initial Funding Schedule
In order to get the most out of monetr, you’ll need to tell monetr how frequently you want to contribute to your budgets. To get started with this monetr asks that you setup an initial funding schedule for your manual budget. You can change or delete this later.
Finishing Up
Click Finish to complete your manual budget creation. You’ll be redirected to your budget’s page afterwards!
