That's it, I'm creating a new category under "savings" called "cash reserves". It's too easy to mess up when I zelle my babysitter and YNAB uses the cash that I put in my babysitting category

what do you mean?

I tried dumping any cash in my wallet into my "babysitting" category, but then I zelled my babysitter and YNAB tried to use the available cash for it. so instead I just created a new "savings" category for cash, similar to an emergency fund

don't you have a cash account?

yes, I have a cash account, and yes, zelle takes money out of checking, but if my cash is assigned to babysitting, then ynab attempts to use it when I categorize the zelle transaction to babysitting

what do you mean "attempts" to use? you're the one telling ynab where the money came from and what it was sfor

ynab's agnostic about what account the money came from, so when I zelle a babysitter, it lowers the amount available in my babysitting category, even though I haven't touched the cash So it makes more sense to treat cash on hand in the same way as an emergency fund - I never assign anything to that category directly, but I can move money out of that category to cover whichever category needs it

I feel like I disagree with the conclusion in this thread, but I'm also not really following it very well lol

@numerous-pager-5334 help rephrase this thread so people can understand it better

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@numerous-pager-5334 help rephrase this thread so people can understand it better

Sure! Here’s a simple way to explain what Rachel and Avi are talking about: Rachel wanted to keep track of money she uses for babysitting. She put cash from her wallet into a “babysitting” category in her budget app (YNAB). But when she paid her babysitter using Zelle (which comes from her bank account), the app tried to use the cash she had set aside for babysitting, even though she didn’t actually spend that cash. So, Rachel decided to make a new “cash reserves” category under savings. This is like an emergency fund. She doesn’t spend directly from this category. Instead, if she needs money for something, she moves it out of “cash reserves” into the right spending category. Avi asked if Rachel has a cash account and pointed out that Zelle payments come from checking, not cash. Rachel explained that YNAB doesn’t care which account the money comes from—it just looks at how much is in each category. Rachel’s idea: Treat cash on hand like an emergency fund. Don’t assign it directly to spending categories. Move it only when you need it. Takeaway: If you want to keep your cash separate and not accidentally spend it in your budget app, make a special savings category for it and only move money out when needed. Let me know if you want this even simpler!

yeah so we also have cash on hand for specific expenses but don’t have this issue at all so i feel like something is being lost in communication. It says “She put cash from her wallet into a “babysitting” category” I think that is where the mistake is. Specific money is not assigned to a category, since, as you pointed out, ynab doesn’t care what account the money is in. So to, when you spend it, YNAB doesn’t use the cash from the cash account by default, so I am not seeing what the issue is. YNAB won’t pull from an account bc ynab doesn’t create transactions by itself. You categorize the transactions, and for a cash account, you have to manually add transactions. What am I missing here?

The problem is that I didn't use cash for the babysitter. I used zelle. If I assign that zelle transaction to babysitting, by default it starts to use up the cash that I assigned to that category, and I have to manually assign more. That way I'm erring on the side of caution, if I forget to move cash to the proper category, YNAB will show that I have less money than I actually do. Whereas if I put the cash straight to 'babysitting', and forget to assign more money when I zelle my babysitter, it would be an error on the side of risk

oh some some babysitters take zelle and some take cash?

some sisters pay your shared babysitter on your behalf, and the sisters accept zelle 😀

gotcha, we make them all take zelle even when they don't want to haha

lol where I live the babysitters have the upper hand

lol