Ask the readers – AU specific financial software?

10:52AM September 19, 2007 | Sarah Stokely

Reader Zack sent in a question which I haven’t yet been able to answer, so I thought I’d throw it open to the readers and see what we find out.
Zack asks:

“My wife and I are trying to keep better track of our finances and are looking for an online option so we can each enter expenses as they come in. We had been using Quicken in the States, but since we can’t get it to download transactions from ANZ or correctly interpret Aussie date format, we’ve tossed it. We don’t need anything super special. We just want to see how much we have and be able to see where our money is going.”

So, Lifehacker AU readers – hit us with your tips for financial software – and it doesn’t need to be a commercial accounting package like Quicken either – I’m keen to hear about software apps you use to track expenses on your PC, PDA or online. You don’t need to keep it just about expense tracking either – feel free to nominate your favourite Australian-friendly budgetting tools like The Money Orb, which we wrote about recently.

Comments

Leon Ridge-Cooke

September 19, 2007 at 1:15 PM

I’ve tried many but have found Google Spreadsheets to be the best in the end.

Dave

September 19, 2007 at 1:22 PM

I personally use MS Money.
No idea if it talks to banks or not however as I’ve never used that function as I prefer the finer control of doing it all manually. But then I’m anal.

Jason

September 19, 2007 at 1:55 PM

I use iBank from IGG software (http://www.iggsoftware.com/)
It works fine with ANZ – download files as quicken format and iBank imports the AU formatted date with no problems.

Stumblng Tumblr

September 19, 2007 at 4:26 PM

I use Gnucash for Linux, which I believe has been ported to Windows.

It understands Australian.

Neil

September 19, 2007 at 4:49 PM

I’ve played a bit with expensr (https://www.expensr.com/), the free ajaxy website. Have had no problems importing from Citibank Australia.

What we need for Australia is Mint (www.mint.com). Real time money tracking.

xzackly

September 19, 2007 at 9:48 PM

Thanks Sarah!

I appreciate any advice that comes our way. A big hearty Yeaaaaaarrrgggghhhh to Lifehacker on this splendid Talk Like a Pirate Day.

BM

September 19, 2007 at 10:44 PM

Some of you might cringe, but I use an Excel spreadsheet that I’ve customized to track my expenses. Does what I want in the format I want. It just took a bit of time to perfect.

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