Being a student, I know that budgeting prudently and knowing exactly how much you’ve got in my accounts is very important. There’s nothing worse than logging on to your online banking and realising that all those “little transactions” you made a few days ago have put a big dent in your balance.
There is a enormous range of personal finance software out there and every single platform, whether it be desktop or mobile, has a mind-boggling array of options. However, I find that many of these programs come with unnecessary features that the average user doesn’t need.
Of course, these features come at a price, and with many personal finance programs you are paying for features that you will never end up using. I, like probably a lot of people, just want a program that shows me what I’m spending my money on.
This is where The Birdy kicks in. It’s a simple, lightweight, web-based personal finance tracker which helps you keep track of your daily spending, showing you exactly where and what you are spending your hard-earned pennies on. The icing on the cake is that The Birdy is completely free, with no signup or subscription fees to pay.
This all sounds brilliant, doesn’t it? Let’s take a closer look at The Birdy and its features.
Introduction
The Birdy is a simple, web-based finance manager which works in almost all browsers (I have tested it in IE, Firefox, Safari and Chrome). On loading up the homepage, you are greeted with a nice, simple splash screen that lists The Birdy’s features and gives you an overview of the whole program.
The simple, intuitive home page of The Birdy
Registering takes 9.5 seconds according to the developer (it’s true – I’ve timed it) and all you need to provide is your e-mail address and a password – there’s no complicated forms to fill in. Once you’ve registered you are redirected to your dashboard, which shows you your purchases so far for the current month.
The dashboard, which shows your purchases for the current month
Features
For a free service, The Birdy certainly does pack a punch when it comes to features! Let’s have a look at these in a bit more detail.
Adding A Purchase
The Birdy allows you to keep track of your spending in five different currencies: US dollars, British pounds, Euros, Japanese yen and Russian roubles. Adding a purchase to The Birdy is extremely simple. You simply click on “Quick, Add A Purchase” then enter the amount and the category.
Adding a purchase takes no time at all in The Birdy
Hash Tags
Like Twitter, The Birdy supports hashtags, so you can add certain tags to your purchases to keep better track of them. Say, for example, you want to track how much you spend on petrol for two different cars. When entering the purchase into The Birdy, all you do is include a hash tag after the purchase, for example #ford or #volkswagen.
Reviewing Your Purchases
You can review your purchases in a number of ways. You can view them either using a pie chart, which graphs your purchases by category and lets you know how much you are spending in each category:
Your purchases in pie-chart view
Or, you can use a line graph, which shows your purchases over time. This is obviously useful if you are trying to stick under a certain amount each month.
Your purchases over time and by category
Finally, you can view the total of your daily purchases on a calendar. This feature can if you are trying to stick to a daily budget.
The calendar view in The Birdy, showing the daily total spend
A Daily Reminder E-mail
The Birdy can also send you a daily e-mail reminding you to update your purchases. To do this, all you have to do is reply to the e-mail with your purchases, for example €50 petrol #car; you don’t have to log into your dashboard and do it from there.
This is a useful feature if you’re on the move a lot (you can update your purchases using, for example, your mobile) and it saves the need to trawl through endless receipts and invoices every evening.
Conclusion
No matter what your requirement is, The Birdy seems to cover it. It is a very flexible program and has a wide range of uses. It allows you keep exact track of what you are spending your hard-earned cash on and the fact that it is simple to use as well as free just makes it even better.
Of course, if you are switching from another personal finance software such as Moneydance or Microsoft Money then you might find The Birdy a little lacking in features. But I found that there are so many features in these programs that are completely unnecessary. The Birdy takes its assignment and does it extremely well, plus you don’t have to spend an hour learning how it works or meddling with it before you start using it!
Nowadays, simpler is better and The Birdy has hit the nail right on the head in all areas. The interface is uncluttered and well-designed and the developer, Corey, has even included a little eye-candy in where necessary (such as the animated pie chart).
If you’re going to take on board only one piece of financial advice then let it be this: sign up to The Birdy and use it on a regular basis. It’ll help you budget easily and prudently and proves the saying that money does have a way of taking wings. It’s not enough to balance your checkbook, but it might be enough to get you on track keeping up with your spending. For most of us, that’d be a major accomplishment!