[draven]

I started to use PTA several times already, and I always have an issue with the granularity of transactions. For example when I go to the local supermarket, do I track food and hygiene products separately ? Some supermarkets give the subtotal for different categories, some don´t. It could be useful to see where the money goes.

I'm about to start out again and I chose not to track different categories individually, knowing that I can still add sub-accounts to distinguish between them later (even if I can´t recover the information for older transactions.)

Now I just need to investigate how to track gains/losses on the ETFs I own but that's common enough that there should be information out there on how to do it.

[floodle]

It's about the value to you versus the effort you put in. For me the granularity you are talking about is too much effort. All my supermarket shops go in one big category "groceries and household".

Start easy and see what you want to get out of the data. If you can store the original source (e.g receipts) so that you can later go back and increase the granularity if you find yourself wanting it, that would be ideal.

[awpeofia]

Right, don't let decision paralysis prevent tracking.

I just put "Groceries" account based on the total that gets charged to my card. If there's a substantial item that doesn't fall into groceries then I can split that out on a case-by-case basis (e.g. I go to Costco and buy both a bunch of cereal and a dehumidifier).

[phyzix5761]

I charge different category items on different receipts which means doing several transactions at the store. Thankfully, its only 1 time per week. I've gotten pretty quick at it at the self checkout.