My Envelopes are showing negative. Why?!

Update

EEBA is now Goodbudget! Goodbudget has all the great features of EEBA (and more!) in a new and updated interface. Check out our updated article on this topic, and check out the Goodbudget Help Center for the most recent help content.

Q: I’m recording transactions using EEBA, but my envelopes are all showing red/negative. Why?

In most cases, the confusion is that in the envelope budgeting method, you have to fill your envelopes *first* and *then* spend out of them.

When you Set Up Your Budgets initially, we don’t automatically fill your envelopes with money for you. You can do that using “Add $” on your Android phone or “Envelopes…Add Money” on the website.

At the beginning of the month (for example; or whichever budgeting period you choose), you would fill your envelopes. Then throughout the month, you take money out of them as you pay for various things.

You may find this video to be helpful with respect to how Envelope Budgeting works:

And this video may also be helpful for how EEBA works with respect to syncing to phones (if you’re using an Android)

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2 thoughts on “My Envelopes are showing negative. Why?!”

  1. How do you handle Credit card usage? I have a really tight budget that doesn’t account for Miscellaneous expenses. Right now I have an envelope for Credit card payments and I just pay for unexpected expenses on a credit card and use that bulk of the credit card envelope to pay it back down.

  2. Michael, apologies for the late response. You might want to try these blog posts that talk about credit card usage:

    https://www.goodbudget-qa.dayspring-tech.com/2010/10/credit-card-balances-on-cards-youre-working-on-paying-off-pluspremium/

    https://www.goodbudget-qa.dayspring-tech.com/2010/07/how-to-account-for-credit-card-purchases-accounts/

    These both apply to our Plus/Premium plans that track accounts. That’s the easiest way to handle credit cards in EEBA.

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