TLDR: Try it, it’s super helpful especially for reconciliation. You can also do it on iOS (can’t say anything about Android):
- File export: if your bank doesn’t support QFX, OFX, QIF, or CSV (YNAB info page), you can export a QIF file from e.g. Banking4 for iOS (add your bank account, then under menu → tools → data export). If you only have a CSV, you can use this tool to prepare it.
- File import: Save the file to files and then drag&drop it to the website. For me, it worked best with the free Zoomable App.
- Everything else can be done in the YNAB App
That sounds like a lot, but it’s actually pretty simple. Definitely faster than doing it manually.
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I’ve been using YNAB since 2014, but never used the file based import since it always struck me as too cumbersome. Maybe I was also just misunderstanding the feature, thinking since I’m writing down all transactions I don’t need to import them.
But it’s actually extremely helpful for reconciling. I used to go through every single transaction in my bank account to then find it in my YNAB transactions, which was really tedious if there was even just a small mistake somewhere (I was only doing it once a month). And I never had a full month without any mistakes.
Another reason that kept me from using it, was the feature only being available on desktop, but I’ve since found a way to do it on my phone (iOS). YNAB should really make it possible to import these files directly in the app, but for now I have the workaround as mentioned above.
I used it too (before my banks became available for automatic syncing), yes it’s super useful and well done!
I want automatic syncing so badly, but Europe has never been a priority for them sadly. They partnered with another company that takes care of some European banks, but mine is sadly still not supported.
Yeah I feel you, I’m in France and banks from here were unsupported for the longest time (years), but they were eventually covered by the partner you are talking about (with a few exceptions), I’m crossing my fingers for your banks to be supported soon 🤞
bank2ynab is another sweet tool:
Download a csv file from your bank, then start this script. It will auto-identify the format, convert it to YNAB csv format, and (optionally) auto-upload into your budget.
Thanks for the link! I’ve actually tried quite a few tools but couldn’t get any of them to work and most were quite outdated. It also wouldn’t work on my iPhone which is where I can export the right file format. So I decided to just do it myself.
I also made it so that multiple CSV formats are compatible, you can pick the right columns and it’s saving the config so you only have to do it once.