See where my money actually goes from my bank statements
Your transactions sorted into clear categories with totals, surprises, and three specific changes worth making.
The prompt
Help me see where my money went by sorting my transactions.
Transactions: [PASTE 1-3 MONTHS of statement lines - date, description, amount. Remove account numbers and personal details first.]
Monthly take-home income: [AMOUNT]
Anything I want to understand: [e.g. "why I'm always short by the 25th", "how much goes on food"]
Categories I'd like to use: [YOUR OWN, or "suggest them"]
Do this:
1. Sort every transaction into categories (housing, utilities, groceries, eating out, transport, shopping, subscriptions, health, debt payments, transfers, other). List any you can't confidently categorize under [CHECK] instead of guessing.
2. Exclude transfers between my own accounts so nothing is double-counted.
3. Show a table: Category | Monthly average | % of income | Number of transactions.
4. Point out: the 3 biggest categories, small frequent charges that add up, fees (overdraft, ATM, late fees), and anything that changed a lot between months.
5. Tell me if spending exceeded income in any month.
6. Suggest 3 specific changes with the estimated monthly saving for each, based only on my data.
Use only my figures; don't invent transactions or round in a way that hides the real totals. Keep the summary short and non-judgmental.
Highlighted [brackets] are blanks to replace with your own details.
Fill in the blanks and use this promptMore Personal Life & Wellbeing prompts
What to fill in
- AMOUNT
- YOUR OWN, or "suggest them"
- CHECK
How this prompt is built
This prompt follows the RTF structure (Role, Task, Format). RTF tells the model who to be, what to do and what shape the answer should take. It is the quickest structure that still gives noticeably better results than a bare request.
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