BusimyHow to track expenses in more than one currency
To track expenses in several currencies without losing count, the key is not converting everything into one: each currency needs its own balance, and every exchange (buying or selling another currency) is recorded at the real rate you used. Busimy works like that: each currency kept apart, with daily exchange rates to compare.
Why not convert everything into one currency
If you earn in one currency and save in another, converting everything at today's rate gives you a number that changes every day even if you didn't spend anything. And each expense loses precision.
The clearest is to keep each currency with its own balance. When you want a snapshot of the total, see the conversion separately, knowing which rate was used.
How to record a currency exchange
Example: you change 200 euros into dollars at 1.08. 200 euros leave your euro wallet and 216 dollars arrive in your dollar wallet. Your savings didn't change: they moved from euros to dollars.
- It isn't an expense: it's an exchange. Money leaves one wallet and enters another in the other currency.
- Record both real amounts: how much left and how much came in. The rate comes from that.
- The real rate is the one you paid, not the official one.
- If you later pay for something in that currency, it is an expense in that currency, from that wallet.
How Busimy does it
- Balances per currency: pesos, dollars, euros, crypto and custom currencies, each with its own balance.
- Exchanges at the real rate you used, stored with each transaction.
- Daily exchange rates (in Argentina: official, MEP, blue and card dollar).
- Savings that count exchanges, plus a total converted at today's rate.
- Shared expenses in any currency, with debts per currency or combined.
Credit card purchases in a foreign currency
Card purchases in a foreign currency can often be paid in that currency or in your own. If you pay them with your own currency, record how much left your account and for how much of the foreign amount: that keeps the rate you really paid.
Frequently asked questions
- Which exchange rate does Busimy use?
- The one you pick. For exchanges, the real rate you used is stored.
- Does it work outside Argentina?
- Yes. It works with any world currency and with custom ones (for example, a crypto).
- Can I see everything together?
- Yes: besides each currency on its own, Busimy shows the total converted to your household's currency at today's rate.
- Which rate should I use to see the total?
- The one that helps you decide. In Busimy you pick it, and the total is always shown apart from your real balances.
- Does it work with any currency?
- Yes: euros, dollars, yen, any currency in the world and crypto too. Each with its own balance.