18. Guides

Add Income

Add scheduled inflows for planning, then use actual transactions when the money is received.

Use this guide when you want an incoming paycheck, deposit, or other inflow to inform your future budget plan.

1. Decide whether you are planning or recording money #

Use a scheduled inflow when you want to plan for money that has not arrived yet. Use a normal income transaction when the money has actually been received and should affect an account balance.

They serve different jobs:

a scheduled inflow adds forecast funding to Ready to Plan
an actual transaction contributes to real funding and Ready to Assign

2. Add a scheduled inflow #

Open Scheduled Transactions from Transactions, choose Manage Schedule Rules, then select Add a Schedule. Create an inflow, enter the expected amount and first date, and choose the recurrence that matches the income.

Set the account and payee when they are useful for matching and review. Mark the inflow as income when appropriate. Leave the category as Unassigned when the money should fund the budget generally.

Choose whether the inflow funds the month it is received or the following month. This is especially useful for paychecks near the end of a month.

3. Generate the planned occurrence #

Before planning the month, generate scheduled transactions for that month. Use the Budget contextual sidebar while in Planning Mode, or the generation controls on the Scheduled Transactions page.

The generated pending occurrence is the forecast that contributes to Ready to Plan. Edit it if this paycheck’s date, amount, or funding allocation differs from the usual schedule.

4. Plan what the inflow should fund #

On Budget, switch to Planning Mode and use Ready to Plan to enter Planned Assigned amounts for the categories this inflow should cover. The plan does not change Assigned or your account balance.

5. Record the actual inflow when it arrives #

When the paycheck or deposit is real, add or import it as a normal transaction. Then use Review & Apply to move the selected planned category funding into Assigned as actual funding supports it.

Keep the distinction clear: the scheduled inflow helps you decide what to do in advance; the actual transaction records what happened.