Salary days are the most annoying because you simply have to run the numbers again. The expenses for some weird reason start to appear from every angle including those mysterious friends and family members who for some reason have stored your salary date on their calendar. And with all this chaos, your income sits still watching like the chicken to the slaughter. As you try to battle through this raging war, then the bank hits you just below the belt with those pesky bank alerts charges. For some weird reason, you lose your cool. Good Lord! How in God’s name did I incur 600 Naira on alerts? How? Emotions run in \”How much is the money sef…\” Eyes teary, Hearts frustrated. You vex as people say and run the numbers and you discover at N4 per SMS, that’s a whopping 150 transactions. At this rate, you realize you are either spending too much money or the bank is just being the bank (whatever that means). But for some weird reasons, you let it go, you simply don’t have the energy. Its enough trauma for one day you say and you resign to the inevitable; paying the bills, settling those mysterious people, shunning those you need to, paying your God (based on your faith) and most importantly paying yourself. It\’s just another salary day. On to the next.
But wait a minute! What about those bank alert charges?
What if I told you that those charges are a pointer to your spending patterns which could point to possible cash flow problems and most importantly help you plan your finances better. Before you start imagining how unnecessary this exercise is, I mean it\’s just 600 Naira. Well, this is my story:
I ran a trend analysis on my bank alert charges for the last 6-months and I discovered the following:
The analysis showed my charges rose above the 500 Naira benchmark every 3 months; January, April, and July and fell afterward. The big question was why? So, I spooled my bank statement and ran an analysis and there it was. My spending on Family related matters, Outings, and transportation were the culprit. For some weird reason, these expense heads rise every 3 months. However, diving down to the reason why they do is a big hassle. So, I have decided to implement a few changes which include:
Review the current budget and:
Increase the budget allocation for transportation.
Reduce the budget allocation for Outings.
Slightly increase the budget allocation for Family related matters.
Setup new controls for the Family related matters and Outings expense heads in other to keep the expenses within the new limits.
Implement a budget review session every month to review the last month\’s expense. (And yes I am a walking organization. Lol!)
With these measures, my expenses are expected to fall lower than the current trend next month. Fingers Crossed!
And there you have it, one new thing you learned from your bank alerts.
Commentaires