Pastel My Money, an online personal finance management tool, is now available to everyone with web access, for free and aims to make personal finances management simple.
Tough economic times call for stricter control of personal finances. But it’s not easy to save money if you don’t know how it’s being spent. Pastel My Money is an ideal tool to manage transactions and track spending. Because it‘s online you have control over your finances from anywhere through a computer, tablet or smart phone, as long as there‘s an internet connection.
“œThe need for mobility is a reality in everyone‘s lives and a personal financial management tool in the cloud is the perfect way for money-conscious consumers to manage their budget,“ says Steven Cohen, managing director of Softline Pastel.
Each profile allows up to three users and three households all at no cost, which means no monthly payment hassles or expensive installation fees. Getting started is as easy as registering on the website.
Probably the best feature of Pastel My Money is the automatic bank feed which imports bank statements from an unlimited number of internet bank and credit card accounts. For a monthly fee equivalent to one cappuccino, Pastel My Money will update and automatically refresh the account daily with any new transactions available in online banking, meaning that users are never out of touch with their financial status.
Some of the other attractive features from Pastel My Money include the ability to automatically attach till slips to a transaction by taking a photo with a smartphone, or by scanning slips onto a computer. Insurance also becomes a breeze because the details of household contents can be recorded on the program, including where they were purchased, the purchase price, the replacement value and a photograph of each item.
Other features include expense categories that can be created by the user but will be remembered by Pastel My Money so everytime a transaction is captured, it is automatically assigned to a category ““ this function makes it really easy to track and analyse expenses. A budget can also be created based on a user‘s past spending which can then be compared to actual spending.
Pastel My Money provides an overview of all bank balances, transactions, and spending habits in one place. Spending categories and groups can tell the user whether they are spending money on essentials or splashing out on unnecessary items. This can be generated into a report tracking income versus expenses over time, which can be printed or emailed.
Data is backed up daily, encrypted and stored in a managed hosted environment which means your spending trends will never be lost.
The last few years have been difficult for South African consumers. “œWith an economy still recovering from the global economic crisis and prices on essential items like petrol and electricity on the rise, we are all, regardless of economic status, acutely aware of how stretched our bank balance really is,“ says Cohen. “œInitially we wanted to develop a piece of software to help our clients manage their personal finances. But because we’ve all been through the wringer and need as much help with our money management as we can get, Pastel has decided to make the program available to everyone.“
For more about Pastel My Money watch the video below:
