Introduction
Some of the most common budgets we see are cars and transport cost. For those who do own a car, we all know there is more to cost than just fuel. Between road tax, MOT, car insurance, repairs, fuel and payments (for those on PCP or lease) the total amount can top up. In the current climate many people might be considering if owning a car is a necessity or a luxury. Let's help you work that out.
What time frame am I looking at?
Topic Area
Scenario Guides
Relevant to users on:
Money Dashboard Neon
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Disclaimer
All content is for informational purposes only and is the opinion of the author. Nothing on this website should be interpreted as "advice". Money Dashboard Ltd make no representations as to the accuracy, completeness, suitability or validity of any information on this site and will not be liable for any errors or omissions or any damages arising from its display or use.
What is going on?
The core features we are going to use is budgets and Spend Analysis. You have 2 options:
- Use the transportation category to categorise your transport transactions
- Create a custom category called "car" and go from there
More information about how to create a custom category can be found here.
Am I including car insurance?
That is a personal choice. Some people like to and others don't.
What time frame am I looking at?
With cars you tend to have once a year payments and monthly payments. Examples are:
- Once a year: Road Tax, MOT, car insurance (potentially)
- Ongoing: Car insurance (potentially), fuel, PCP/lease payments
That means you are probably going to need to look over a couple of time horizons. You will need to look monthly and yearly.
What features should I use?
As mentioned above, you will need to be looking over different time horizons to understand the big picture of how much you are spending. Aside from monitoring on a pay cycle basis, we would recommend for you to use the 'Overview' tool to factor in yearly costs such as Road Tax, MOT and potentially, car insurances. You can do this via the full web application.
1. Select 'Overview' on your side navigational bar
2. Use the 'Time period' filter to select the period you wish to analyse your car costs - a good starting point would be to begin from last year's data before moving on to this year's.
3. Filter the 'Transport' or custom created category. Ensure that all accounts that you might have been spending at for your car are toggled on too under the 'Accounts' selection.
What about comparing what I have spent this year against last year?
Similar to the above steps, this time round you will be using the 'Overview:Trends' on your full web application to view this information.
1. Select 'Overview' on your side navigational bar
2. Click on 'Trends' (the default view on Overview is the breakdown)
3. Use the 'Time period' filter first to select the yearly frequency
4. Filter the relevant category (either transport or the custom category you have created) using the 'Categories' filter. Ensure that all accounts that you might have been spending at across the selected categories are toggled on under the 'Accounts' selection.
5. Lastly, use the 'Compare against' to choose how far back you wish to compare your spends against