Smart Features

Every transaction that arrives - synced, imported or typed - runs through the same sequence, and the first step that produces an answer wins:

1. Your own rules. If one of your Transaction Rules matches, it decides. Rules are checked ahead of everything below, and the first one that matches wins - so the order you put them in is the order they are asked in.
2. What you have taught it. If you have corrected this merchant before, your category is used.
3. Its own merchant and keyword patterns. A built-in list that recognises the common ones and puts them in Groceries, Coffee & Cafes, Transit & Rideshare and the rest.
4. What your bank or your file said. The category that came with a synced transaction, or the category column of a CSV if you mapped one.

Once a category is settled, the transaction is linked to whichever budget has that category attached. That is why linking categories when you create a budget matters more than assigning transactions one by one - see Budgets.

Correct a category and Cadence Money records that you preferred it for that merchant. One correction is enough - the next transaction from that merchant already goes to your category, on imports as well as syncs. Correcting it again does not unlock anything; it only makes the preference harder to outweigh later.

Learning is per merchant, not per keyword, and it is yours alone - nothing is shared between accounts. Different branches of one merchant learn together, so TIM HORTONS #4321 and TIM HORTONS #0877 share what you taught. Learning also follows the direction of the money: a refund from a store does not inherit the category you taught for purchases there. It is also the reason a fresh account feels less accurate than one you have used for a few months.

Learning waits for you to correct something. A Transaction Rule is the version you write yourself: you set the conditions and the outcome, and it applies from the moment you save it rather than after the fact.

There are three places to create one:

• The + menu, which has a Transaction Rule entry on every screen.
• Settings → Transaction Rules, which is also the only place you can edit, reorder or delete one.
• The checkbox on the prompt that appears when you correct a category - see Applying a Correction to a Whole Merchant in Categories.

The two systems sit in a fixed order, and it is worth knowing which:

• Rules are asked first, ahead of everything Cadence Money has learned or recognises on its own. Among your rules, the first one that matches wins.
• Learning fills the gaps. Anything your rules do not answer falls through to your learned preferences and then to the built-in patterns, so the two do not compete.
• A rule can set more than a category. Every rule names a category, and it can also set a budget, tie the transaction to a bill or an income source, or count it towards a goal.

Full details, including what a rule can match on and how to apply one to transactions you already have, are in Transaction Rules.

Start typing a name on a manual transaction and Cadence Money offers names you have used before. Take one with Enter, move through them with the arrow keys, or dismiss them with Esc.

Consistent names are worth more than the keystrokes they save: search, category learning and recurring detection all key off the name, so three spellings of the same merchant look like three merchants.

Everything above runs on transactions as they arrive. For the ones already sitting uncategorised, the All Activity header carries a sparkle button beside the title, with the number of uncategorised synced transactions on it.

Tap it and Cadence Money works through them, running each one through the same sequence a new transaction takes. The number becomes a running count while it goes, so you can see how far along it is.

When a charge turns out to be a subscription, you do not have to retype it. Open the transaction and choose Create Recurring Bill - or Create Income Source on a deposit - and the name, amount and category are carried across for you to confirm.

Cadence Money also spots these on its own and offers them as suggested bills. See Recurring Detection.

Everything here lives under Settings → Suggestions. The Transaction Behaviour card holds the two automation switches:

• Transaction Name Suggestions - whether it offers names as you type.
• Smart Categories - whether Cadence Money categorises a new transaction for you at all.

Under those sits Clear Category Learning, whose Clear Learning button wipes every merchant preference Cadence Money has picked up from your corrections. The button only appears when there is something to clear, so an account that has never corrected anything sees the row without it.

Worth knowing so you are not waiting on something that will not come:

• Cadence Money never moves money, never pays a bill, and never changes an amount you entered.
• A suggested expected income amount is offered, never applied - see Tracking Income.
• Transfers are recognised as transfers so they do not read as spending, but a transfer pair you record by hand still needs both sides. See Transfers & Payments.