Why Does The One-Month Budget Display "Zero Income" Categories As Expenses?

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Casablanca
Casablanca Member ✭✭
in Budgeting and Planning Tools (Mac)
We lost my wife's income because of the pandemic. However, when I enter zero for her income, the One-Month Budget lists that income category as an expense. I found an old discussion instructing a user to enter $1 in that budget category in this circumstance. This solution creates a budget that will be off by $1. This defeats the purpose of the software entirely! I should be able to accurately track income and expenses especially when dealing with drastic changes in our income. Small forced corrections create larger errors down the road. (G.I.G.O.)

Is there a way that the developers can correct the error instead of me using the $1 entry band-aid I mention above?
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  • John_in_NC
    John_in_NC SuperUser, Mac Beta Beta
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    Hi, Casablanca:

    I can reproduce this, when I set the budget goal for the month to $0. Part of the bug/issue here is that that older single month budget report is expecting a budgeted value as it is was built for a single 12 month goal. (And most users don't track an annual budget without a goal.) If you leave the goal amount alone, (and have no income), the budget correctly displays. If you are not seeing this, please post back.

    Yes, you can tamper with the goals, and that will throw the annual goal off. I don't suggest that. As you have likely found, the 12 month view doesn't have this issue. You might wish to use that.

    Why you are zeroing out the goal for the month(s)? If your wife lost her income, your goal should remain the same, and the $0 shortfall (while unfortunately unpleasant) should hit your budget accordingly as you didn't get the $ you expected. I would want my budget to reflect this as it is real world. If she is permanently unemployed, then I would stop tracking it in the budget.
  • Casablanca
    Casablanca Member ✭✭
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    @John_in_NC...Thanks for the response! You are correct, the 12 month budget does treat the current real-world situation correctly. While I do expect my wife to find another job in the near future, I don't feel comfortable with either entering a figure that we "expect" to receive as income or removing her income category entirely from the budget. The latter would affect on the previous months of income and the associated reports. I suppose my best course of actions is as you suggest...view the 12 month budget. I hope the developers will see this post and add it to their bug repair list.
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