managing categories & payee filtering

[a2457123]

I'm evaluating MMEX (1.8.0, currently under Linux -- later to add Mac and Android clients) and it looks like it will meet most of my needs.

While the "category manager" is a nice interface, setting up a large number of new categories is tedious. For example, I'd like to have categories such as "fuel", "maintenance", "registration", "insurance" for multiple vehicles, which would be easy if there was a way to copy and paste a category and it's children, or better still, a way to export category definitions to a text file, edit that file, and import it as a new set of categories.

There are similar issues of inefficiency with assigning payees to categories. I've imported data (via OFX to QIF conversion) from several bank accounts and I've now got 1999 unique payees from 7K+ transactions.

I'm looking for ways to define and categorize transactions more efficiently than using the GUI, as well as suggestions for more complex categorization.

• Is there a way to export and import payee filtering (categorization, renaming) rules to/from a text file?

• Is there a way to apply payee filtering rules to existing transactions, or are they only applied at import? (If the latter, I can delete all transactions and then re-import the data, but this is cumbersome when creating and refining many filtering rules.)

• Can payee filtering apply rules based on data in fields beyond the payee name? For example, I've got 149 transactions with the string "At ATM" in the Payee field. If the transaction amount is a withdrawal for under $5USD then I'd categorize the transaction as a fee, if it's a withdrawal over $5 it would simply be a cash withdrawal, if it's for a deposit, it would be categorized as a deposit.

• Can data import filtering (or post-import filtering applied to existing transactions) change categories without being specific to a Payee? For example, I've got multiple transactions beginning with the string "Adjustment" (followed by the vendor name), indicating a refund or vendor credit of some kind. I'd like to categorize the transactions the same way, but without changing the payee name, so defining a new Payee named "Adjustment" and matching on a regex "^Adjustment\s" wouldn't work, as that would also change how the payee name is displayed.

• When a Payee is edited to give a different name, is the original payee record kept within the database with the original payee name unchanged in order to preserve the data exactly as it was imported, and the "new name" is simply shown as user-friendly alias, or is the actual record altered? Is there any audit trail of changes made to each record (for example, changing a payee name like "BPacmebank" to "Mortgage payment to Acme Bank via Bill Payer" for each imported transaction matching "BPacmebank")?

• Can filtering add tags as well as assigning a transaction to a category? For example, I've got transactions where the QIF "Memo" field (imported as "Notes" in MMEX) includes a country name, which would allow the transaction to be tagged as a "Vacation" expense, allowing distinction of ATM withdrawals domestically and during travel.

• Within the Payee Manager GUI, it appears possible to select (highlight) multiple payees, but there doesn't seem to be a way to edit all selected entries at once -- for example, to assign them all the same category ("Dining"). The same steps (multiple selection, edit, choose category) can be applied to individual transactions, which isn't as efficient when there are multiple transactions from the same payees.

[guanlisheng]

hi @a2457123 , thanks for the detailed list. will try to answer some

When a Payee is edited to give a different name, is the original payee record kept within the database with the original payee name unchanged in order to preserve the data exactly as it was imported, and the "new name" is simply shown as user-friendly alias, or is the actual record altered? Is there any audit trail of changes made to each record (for example, changing a payee name like "BPacmebank" to "Mortgage payment to Acme Bank via Bill Payer" for each imported transaction matching "BPacmebank")?

The payee edit will be applied to all associated transactions to manage the complexity. it could be easily verified through the MMEX app.

[a2457123]

hi @a2457123 , thanks for the detailed list. will try to answer some

When a Payee is edited to give a different name, is the original payee record kept within the database with the original payee name unchanged in order to preserve the data exactly as it was imported, and the "new name" is simply shown as user-friendly alias, or is the actual record altered? Is there any audit trail of changes made to each record (for example, changing a payee name like "BPacmebank" to "Mortgage payment to Acme Bank via Bill Payer" for each imported transaction matching "BPacmebank")?

The payee edit will be applied to all associated transactions to manage the complexity. it could be easily verified through the MMEX app.

That doesn't answer the question.

When a payee is edited, is the original data in the transaction altered, or is the original data unchanged, but other data (the category, an "alias" that displays a different name for the transaction) added to the transaction record?

What do you mean

it could be easily verified through the MMEX app

?

For example, imagine there are transactions imported from my bank where the original transaction recorded has the payee name "BPacmebank", and I have a filter in MMEX to match the string "BPacmebank" and rename the payee to "Mortgage payment to Acme Bank via Bill Payer".

Now imagine that I made a mistake in the regular expression and renamed all transactions that began with "BP" to have the payee name "Mortgage payment to Acme Bank via Bill Payer" -- this would affect transactions for 20+ different payees that are all done through my bank's Bill Payer system.

How exactly would I easily verify the original name of the payee for each transaction?

[guanlisheng]

All the original data in the transaction will be altered, as it will be applied to all associated transactions.

you can create a few transactions and edit the payee(s) to verify the behavior.

[Renato]

Perhaps it would help if you could explain to us how you intend to work.
I hardly think that you will be importing 7000 transactions from 1999 payees every month.
MMEX would probably not be the right programme either.
From my point of view, a level of detail of thousands of payees does not make sense either.
Many analyses become confusing and rather slow.