this post was submitted on 29 Aug 2023
20 points (79.4% liked)

Australia

3520 readers
119 users here now

A place to discuss Australia and important Australian issues.

Before you post:

If you're posting anything related to:

If you're posting Australian News (not opinion or discussion pieces) post it to Australian News

Rules

This community is run under the rules of aussie.zone. In addition to those rules:

Banner Photo

Congratulations to @Tau@aussie.zone who had the most upvoted submission to our banner photo competition

Recommended and Related Communities

Be sure to check out and subscribe to our related communities on aussie.zone:

Plus other communities for sport and major cities.

https://aussie.zone/communities

Moderation

Since Kbin doesn't show Lemmy Moderators, I'll list them here. Also note that Kbin does not distinguish moderator comments.

Additionally, we have our instance admins: @lodion@aussie.zone and @Nath@aussie.zone

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
all 29 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] Ilandar@aussie.zone 18 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

I am very much enjoying this cute phase Zoomers are going through at the moment where they "discover" things we all did 10 - 20 years ago and turn it into a social media trend. Like the dumb phone one that's also happening at the moment, with some young people rejecting smartphones in favour of flip phones Millennials used in high school.

But in all seriousness, this is actually a useful life hack if you are trying to restrict spending or live on a budget.

[–] Junkers_Klunker@lemmy.world 24 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It is not their fault for not knowing, it is our fault for not teaching.

[–] otl@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 1 year ago

Maybe we just need to call it "budgeting hack", not "financial planning".

[–] veroxii@aussie.zone 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah it's a good method but the "envelope" budgeting systemn has existed for decades.

[–] Unforeseen@sh.itjust.works 0 points 1 year ago

What is old is new again, just with bloat on top.

[–] autotldr@lemmings.world 7 points 1 year ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:


Most people use a binder with individual pockets or sleeves, with a label for each expense — for example, groceries, petrol, and eating out.

Financial expert and CEO of WeMoney Daniel Jovevski said the rise in popularity of cash stuffing took him by surprise.

"Having that physical product and that cash in my hand, that makes it a lot more easier to use, and for my mind to comprehend what I'm saving per week."

Mr Jovevski adds the lack of transparency means consumers "probably don't know the total fees they're paying".

He also raises the point that there are some risks involved in carrying around a lot of cash, such as theft, but he acknowledges that "everyone's situation is unique".

It not only lowers the risk factor of having large sums of money at home, but it also means you can still accrue interest on your savings.


The original article contains 893 words, the summary contains 145 words. Saved 84%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

[–] Custoslibera@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

This is insane.

Why would you complicate your life like this when there are digital options to accomplish the same result?

[–] daed@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

It probably works for some people man. More power to em. I agree with you though.

[–] steakmeout@aussie.zone 1 points 1 year ago

Running defence for the budget.

[–] trk@aussie.zone 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I haven't used cash for anything except dodgy Facebook and Gumtree buys in a decade. I currently have the better part of $1000 in cash in my wallet that has collected because I just never use it. I haven't entered a bank branch in probably a similar time frame, and they (BankWest) closed the branches near here so I'm not even sure where to deposit it if I wanted to.

You know what I like about bank accounts? You don't get drunk and leave your bank account in the back of a taxi home. And a house fire doesn't burn down your bank account. There's also a slightly less chance that people will break in to your home and steal your bank account, though it's probably a coin flip compared to scammers and what not.

[–] Urbanfox@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You'll also pay more by going into shops and using cash..

Big bag of dog food from local shop, £65.

Same bag from online only retailer with free shipping? £38.

Cash only is not a good way to budget.

[–] ElleChaise@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

But at what cost? Sure the individual will save in the short run on the occasional bag of dog food, but society at large will lose options that avoid tracking and outside intervention. The push for online shopping isn't for your convenience, it's for control over your life and your spending. In the future there will be only a handful of companies total, and they'll essentially become the government if we don't wake up and shake shit up.

[–] discostjohn@programming.dev 1 points 1 year ago

Imagine having enough money to have the luxury of making moral choices with it lmao

[–] abhibeckert@beehaw.org 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I’m not even sure where to deposit it if I wanted to

I'm not a BankWest customer but I expect you can deposit it at any post office, for free, and it'll be much quicker and more convenient than going to the branch ever was.

[–] unionagainstdhmo@aussie.zone 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Sitting money in different savings accounts is better though since it will earn interest

[–] Taleya@aussie.zone 1 points 1 year ago

Depends. My bank doesn't fee me for sub accounts. A lot of them do.

[–] Anticorp@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

This is nowhere close to new. People have been doing this for centuries. It was called the envelope method a couple generations ago

[–] CheeseToastie@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

So it's the same as running the Google sheets monthly budget template but with cash. Not a bad idea per se, but i can see the risk in withdrawing so much in cash to accomplish it

[–] bmck@lemmy.bmck.au 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I've been wondering if there's a way to do this with actual bank accounts. I know with ING I can only have like 2 savings/transactional accounts (1 joint, 1 personal).

I'd like to be able to spin up accounts for these categories and use them as the "envelopes" instead of relying on cash.

[–] Taleya@aussie.zone 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Yes.

I'm with bank Australia they let me have as many sub accounts as i please, no fees.

There's savings, bill kitty, rates, honeypot (building a six month expense nest egg separate to savings) car kitty, cat emergencies, house emergencies. Anything left on the main card-accessibile account is groceries and pissing away money. Been running that since the 90's. Works so well husband has been throwing his half in there as well since '07

[–] WendyMsGator@aus.social 2 points 1 year ago

@Taleya @bmck

Partner and I have 2 individual accounts where we get our personal money paid in and a main bill paying account that covers everything not related to personal stuff. We both contribute to the main account and pay out from that each fortnight for our "allowances".

[–] bmck@lemmy.bmck.au 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

https://bankaust.com.au/ ?

I was looking at their site and could see anything about sub-accounts?

[–] Taleya@aussie.zone 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Bankaust, yup. You just slap an online saver or three in there.

[–] iamnotacat@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Edit: I wrote the reply before noticing that I was not in a US-centric sub. That's on me. But the general premise of "No, you can't autodebit" or "Sure, I'll let you think you can auto-debit. Doesn't mean I'll have it turned on at that moment" still holds.

Fidelity does not have an upper limit on the number of cash management accounts one can have. At least not one that I've discovered, as yet.

I've been doing this for years, but for me it's more about sequestering money away from the card that I actively use. Ever sat there for a couple days and realized just how many times Apple will try to hit your card(s) the same day? Same with Amazon.

If that card approves, it's because I'm explicitly trying to pay you, not because some company decided they want to be more aggressive with the autopay.

I don't use Zelle etc for that, when I can help it - look at who runs that service. Yeah, no, not giving you even more data so you can make assumptions about my behavior and intentions.

In addition, I've found multi-currency cards with the ability to set aside money to be useful in the same way. I absolutely do not have trust or a prior relationship with everyone I'm paying over the course of a month, which means I want more control over that process than I normally get.

Is it a pain in the ass sometimes? Sure. But it's also annoying to have to unlock cards when I want to use them - doesn't mean that I forego that extra security. The alternative is bad.

[–] abhibeckert@beehaw.org 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

But the general premise of “No, you can’t autodebit” or “Sure, I’ll let you think you can auto-debit. Doesn’t mean I’ll have it turned on at that moment” still holds.

That doesn't hold in Australia. I've never heard of a bank here that allows you to (easily) stop someone from taking money out of your account. In fact, even if the account is empty they might be able to overdraw it if they have the right level of merchant account (I had that happen once, when I booked a flight that was about to depart, and they messed up/failed to charge me for the flight. Three months later someone noticed and my account was charged/overdrawn).

As someone who runs a business that charges customers money all day every day... if I have the customer's details then I can charge their account whatever I want. Sure, I could go to jail (or be sent out of business) if I do the wrong thing... but there isn't really much protection below that point and if I'm only mildly scummy, I'd probably get away with it.

[–] iamnotacat@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago

Here, those charges normally hit our debit cards - not the account itself in the sense that a direct debit skips the card and basically functions like a check/cheque.

Nothing on the card, it declines, they can't charge.

We used to use EFT with our ancient transfer system, still do for direct deposit payroll and such, but otherwise it's all cards here. Very few people use account transfers. so none of that is a risk here. It takes two or three business days, and the merchant has zero visibility into whether or not the transaction will actually approve at the time they make the sale. Online merchants wouldn't send items without cleared payment, but very few even use those transfers anymore because there's just no information on whether the customer actually has the money or not.

In the airline example, they never would have gotten their money unless they were ok with making a very big problem out of it - most companies wouldn't, and most companies would not pursue someone who owed them some nominal amount.

Credit cards don't work like that here, they approve whether you want them to or not unless they're locked, but debit cards lend themselves to sequestering money like that in multiple accts.