When Something Looks Wrong

Most "the app is showing me the wrong thing" reports come down to a handful of causes. Work through the relevant section before assuming a bug.

Bills are on the wrong paycheck

Almost always a due date problem.

Bills are assigned to paychecks by the due date you entered in the Builder. A wrong date puts the bill on the wrong period, making one paycheck look tight and another loose when neither is.

Check the due dates on the bills in the period that looks wrong. Fix them in Expenses or Housing and rebuild.

The paycheck dates themselves are wrong

Check your next payday.

Every pay period is counted forward from the next payday you entered. If that date was wrong — or your employer shifted the cycle since you built the budget — the entire sequence is shifted with it.

Fix it in Income & Current Savings and rebuild. See Editing & Rebuilding a Budget.

I don't see any paychecks

If the Track tab shows Welcome to BetterBudgets instead of paychecks, no budget is active. Open the Archive and make one active.

If you've never built a budget, start at Creating Your First Budget.

I can't go past a certain paycheck

You've reached the end of the plan window. Rebuild the budget to extend it. See Editing & Rebuilding a Budget.

Other paychecks are blurred

On Free, only the current paycheck's bills are shown in full; the rest sit behind an upgrade prompt. See Free vs. Thrive.

"You can only edit items for the previous, current, and next paycheck"

Ticking, editing and adding only work on those three paychecks. Older ones are history; later ones haven't happened yet. Step back with the arrows to one of the three.

I can't edit a bill or paycheck amount

Editing amounts and adding expenses are Thrive features — on Free the paycheck amount says Upgrade to edit, and swiping a bill opens the upgrade screen. See What's Included with Thrive.

If you're on Thrive, check you're on the previous, current or next paycheck (above).

"That is more than your savings can cover"

An edit that costs more — a higher bill, a smaller paycheck, an added expense — comes out of savings. It can borrow from your running savings, but not so much that your running total drops below zero anywhere from that paycheck to the end of the plan. The message tells you how much savings can cover.

If it says Savings already run short later in this plan, your plan dips below zero further on already. You can still make edits that don't make that worse — a smaller change, or a cut somewhere else first.

A debt payment was refused

A payment can't be more than the debt owes going into that paycheck — you'll see something like Visa has $240.00 left. Pay up to $240.00. If the balance itself is wrong, correct Balance after last paycheck on the same form. See Completing Bills.

I can't remove a bill

Only lines you added yourself can be removed. A bill that came with your plan can't be; set its amount to zero instead, and turn on Hide to keep zero lines out of view.

"No longer paid off by the last paycheck"

An edit left a debt with a balance at the end of the plan — usually after lowering a payment or raising a balance. Rebuild the budget to extend the plan and schedule the rest.

My numbers don't add up

The paycheck amount at the top is what's left of this paycheck after the bills you've ticked and any spending logged under a line. It's meant to go down as you tick.

Savings says "Pull From Savings." This paycheck's bills are bigger than the paycheck, and the plan covers the gap from savings built up on lighter checks. Normal for a check that has to cover rent.

Total Savings didn't change when I ticked a bill. Expected. Totals To Date follow the plan and your edits, not your ticks. The one exception is ticking a line with spending logged under it, which returns the leftover to savings. See Totals to Date & Coming Up.

Extra went to a debt I didn't expect. Pay down debt sends freed money to the highest interest rate debt on that paycheck that isn't already ticked.

The dashboard shows "Not enough data yet"

The chart has nothing to draw. Common reasons:

• ›The budget is new and hasn't accumulated history
• ›The selected time range doesn't overlap any completed activity
• ›No budget is active

Most charts need a few pay periods of history before they say anything. A new budget looks sparse for a couple of weeks — that's expected.

Dashboard numbers don't match my bank

Check whether the bills were actually ticked, and whether edits reflect what really happened.

The dashboard has no view of your accounts. It works from your plan, your edits and what you've ticked, so a bill you paid but didn't tick — or a paycheck that came in different and wasn't corrected — shows up differently from your bank.

If your ticking is current and the numbers still look wrong, check that you're reading the right period — the Month / Paycheck / Year control and the time range both change what the tiles mean. See Your Monthly Numbers.

One month shows much higher income

Probably a three-paycheck month. On a weekly or bi-weekly cycle, some calendar months contain an extra paycheck.

Nothing is wrong, but don't set expectations from it. Switch to Paycheck for the more honest view.

"Debts Do Not Complete"

Your debts aren't projected to clear within the plan window.

Check, in this order:

1. ›Interest rates. The most common cause and the easiest to fix — a rate entered wrong distorts the whole projection. See Debts.
2. ›The plan tier. A gentler plan may not be enough for your debt load. Look at the more aggressive options in your results.
3. ›The surplus itself. If income minus committed costs is genuinely too thin, no allocation fixes it. That's a real finding, not an error.

My projections seem too optimistic

Usually understated expenses.

It's tempting to trim expenses so the dates look better, and it works — producing a plan you can't actually follow. Compare your budgeted figures against what your bills actually come to. If you're consistently over, the inputs are wrong.

Also check Budgeted vs Actual Paycheck Amount on the dashboard. If your real income runs below the planned figure, every date in the plan is optimistic. See Paycheck Insights.

Canvas won't open

Canvas requires a subscription. If you have one and it's still locked, try Restore on Settings → Subscription.

I upgraded but still have Free features

Use Restore on Settings → Subscription. It re-links purchases from your app store account and resolves most cases, including after a reinstall or signing in on a new device.

If Restore doesn't work, contact support with your account email. See Help & Feedback.

Notifications aren't arriving

Both the channel and the topic have to be on, and you have to tap Save Changes. Then check that your device permits notifications for BetterBudgets at the system level.

Full checklist: Notifications.

"No plans are available in your region"

Thrive isn't sold where your app store account is registered. See Region & Currency.

Still stuck?

Send a report through Settings → Support. Include what you expected, what happened, and how to get there — plus which budget and pay period, if it's a numbers problem.

See Help & Feedback.