Bank cash vs Credit card

[sokie]

I'm confused on bank cash vs credit card setup ( or assets vs liabilities ).
Let's say I have 2000 in my bank account and -1800 in liabilities from my credit card.
In the app it seems it expects liabilities to be positive ( 2000 cash 1800 liabilities ).
But there's 2 issues:

• If cash is positive and liabilities is positive ( 2000 cash 1800 liabilities ) it won't match my credit card payment from my bank to the credit card because it expects a negative number on my bank and positive income on my credit card.
• if cash is positive and liabilities is negative ( 2000 in cash and -1800 in liabilities ) then the matching works correctly, but the net worth is wrong ( it says net worth 3800, most probably due to (2000 - (-1800)), note the double negative ).
  So it is very confusing how it should be setup.
  I generally expect my credit card transactions to be negative, and when I repay it then debt goes to 0.

Attached 2 example screenshots.

[dosubot]

Hi @sokie! I'm Dosu and I’m helping the sure team.

The app expects liabilities (like credit card debt) to be set up as positive balances, which represent the amount you owe. When you make a purchase on your credit card, the liability increases; when you make a payment, it decreases. Expenses on credit cards are entered as negative transactions (increasing debt), and payments are positive (decreasing debt). This matches standard accounting logic for liability accounts, but can feel unintuitive if you're used to asset-like behavior or negative balances for debt.

Net worth is calculated as assets minus liabilities, so if liabilities are positive, net worth = cash - credit card debt. If you enter liabilities as negative, the app will add them to your assets, resulting in an incorrect net worth due to the double negative. For transaction matching, payments from your bank to your credit card should be entered as a negative transaction in your bank account (money out) and a positive transaction in your credit card account (debt reduced) source.

The screenshots you attached show liabilities as negative in the UI, which reflects the amount owed, but internally the app expects positive values for liabilities source. This setup is working as intended, but the terminology and UI can be confusing. Improving onboarding and documentation is a known suggestion from the community.

In short: set up your credit card as a liability with a positive balance for the amount owed, enter expenses as negative transactions, and payments as positive. This will ensure net worth and transaction matching work correctly.

To reply, just mention @dosu.

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[sokie]

@dosu but then if I make a payment on my credit card, both are negative values, so they won't be able to be automatically matched going from bank cash -> credit card.

[dosubot]

For automatic matching to work, payments from your bank to your credit card should be entered as a negative transaction in your bank account (money out) and a positive transaction in your credit card account (payment reducing debt). The matching logic expects transactions in different accounts, same currency, and opposite signs—so if both sides are negative, they won't match automatically.

Example:

• In your bank account: enter the payment as -€500 (withdrawal).
• In your credit card account: enter the payment as +€500 (reducing debt).

This setup follows standard liability accounting and matches the app's expectations for transfers. More details on the matching logic are in the Account Transfers documentation and discussion here.

To reply, just mention @dosu.

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[sokie]

@dosu but that is the problem!
In your bank account: enter the payment as -€500 (withdrawal).
In your credit card account: enter the payment as +€500 (reducing debt).
+500 in the credit card increases your debt!
It's -500 in bank account, and -500 in credit card ( reducing debt ).
So the auto-matcher logic needs to be changed between cash and liabilities ( or at least for credit cards ).

[dosubot]

The app’s auto-matcher logic is built around standard liability accounting: payments to a credit card (liability) must be entered as a positive transaction in the credit card account to reduce debt, and as a negative transaction in your bank account to reflect the withdrawal. The matcher only links transactions with opposite signs—so if both sides are negative, they won’t match automatically. This is enforced by the code and is consistent with how the app calculates net worth and balances for liabilities. The confusion comes from the fact that, in the app, a positive transaction on a credit card account reduces the amount owed, even though it feels backwards if you expect negative numbers to always mean “less debt” source.

Changing the matcher to allow both sides to be negative would break the accounting logic and net worth calculations, so the current behavior is intentional and hardcoded source. The maintainers recognize this is confusing and have discussed improving onboarding and documentation, but the matching logic itself is not considered a bug source.

If you want payments to match automatically, enter them as negative in your bank account and positive in your credit card account. If you enter both as negative, you’ll need to match them manually.

To reply, just mention @dosu.

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[dkeners]

Hey @sokie, stepping in here so you don't have to chat with the hallucinating AI. Please check out the guide here. There is a (hopefully) good explanation on liability accounts and how they are tracked. Happy to take feedback on making the documentation better :).

TL:DR: liabilities are a collection of debt that you gain with a bank (adding money to what you owe a bank) until you pay it off (- money from account). If you make a transfer from an account to the liability account using the transfer feature you will see money removed from the bank account and reducing the CC/liability debt.

Happy to answer other questions you may have!

[sokie]

@dkeners thanks, the liability part was correct.
I was importing my cc transactions, and you need to import transactions with "incomes are negative". In the UI the expenses will show as negative, but will be treated properly then ( positive builds debt, negative lowers debt ).
It was a bit confusing between the UI and importing.
So now indeed it works correctly!