Transactions
Transfers, duplicates and reserved rows
Three kinds of row behave differently from an ordinary transaction: a merged transfer between your own accounts, a row flagged as a possible duplicate, and a reserved payment your bank has not finished. Here is what each one is and what you can do with it.
Why is one row an account with an arrow to another?
Penge recognises money moved between two of your own connected accounts during a bank sync and merges both sides into one row reading one account, an arrow, and the other. Without it the same money would count as income on one account and spending on the other.
Unlink a merged transfer
- Find the row in the transactions list. Under the two account names it shows the category and the amount, and the category is normally Internal transfer.
- Swipe the row from right to left, or press and hold it and choose Unlink transactions. A full swipe does nothing, so let go and tap the button.
- Read the dialog Are you sure you want to unlink these transactions? It says the action cannot be undone.
- Tap Unlink. You now have two ordinary transactions, each with its own category and tags.
Good to know
- There is no button anywhere that marks something as a transfer by hand. Penge finds the pairs during a bank sync.
- A merged row cannot be tapped. It has no detail screen, so unlinking is the only way to reach either side.
- Matching is strict: same day, exactly opposite amounts, same currency, two different accounts, and a bank that reports the other party's account number. Banks that do not report it never merge.
- Only untouched transactions are paired. Once one side has a note, a date you set, a split or a category of your own, it is left alone. Do not count on an unlinked pair merging again.
- Money in and Money out hide merged transfers, so a transfer will not show up in either view.
- Related transactions at the bottom of a transaction is a different feature. It links two transactions for navigation and does not change statistics.
Possible duplicate
Some banks send transactions without an id Penge can rely on. For those, a sync can flag a row as a possible duplicate. The row shows a small warning line reading Possible duplicate, and opening it puts a warning card at the top of the screen. Most people never see it, because it depends entirely on the bank.
- Open the flagged transaction and compare it with the row you think it duplicates.
- Tap Not a duplicate to keep it. The flag goes away and a short confirmation appears.
- Or tap Delete duplicate and confirm in Delete duplicate transaction?. It is removed for good.
- If you spot a duplicate that is not flagged, tap Edit in the top right and choose Report as duplicate. That option only exists for transactions that came from a bank sync.
Reserved transactions
A reserved transaction is one your bank is holding but has not finalized. In the list it is dimmed, with a clock in place of the category icon and a Reserved badge. Tapping it opens a card headed Reserved transaction with an explanation, and under it the description, amount, date and account, all read-only.
Good to know
- A reserved transaction cannot be categorized, tagged, split, spread, linked or deleted. Those sections are not there at all, rather than greyed out.
- They are left out of your statistics, and they never count towards the uncategorized badge.
- Every sync replaces the whole set, so a reserved row can disappear and come back as an ordinary transaction with a different id.
- Your bank usually confirms it within a few days. It then becomes a normal transaction you can edit.
Get a full overview with Penge
Connect your bank and let the app categorize and budget automatically.
Questions about this
- Can I mark two transactions as a transfer myself?
- No. There is no such button in the app. Pairing happens on the server during a bank sync, and it needs both sides to arrive with the account numbers that let Penge match them.
- Will an unlinked pair merge again on the next sync?
- Only if both rows are still untouched, which they rarely are once you have categorized or tagged them. Treat unlinking as a one-way move.
- I never see the duplicate card. Is something wrong?
- No. It only appears for banks whose transactions arrive without a unique id. If yours sends one, Penge has no reason to guess and the card never shows.
- Why can I not categorize a reserved transaction?
- Because your bank can still change it. Penge replaces the whole set of reserved rows on every sync, so anything you set would be thrown away. Wait for the bank to confirm it.