Sample Category Systems: three starting points

The hardest part is usually just getting started

When you set up categories in YAFFA for the first time, a blank list can feel daunting. How granular should you go? Should housing be one category or five? What if you change your mind later?

The good news: there is no single correct answer, and YAFFA is designed to let you start wherever feels comfortable and evolve from there. The three systems below are practical starting points — not prescriptions. Pick the one closest to your current needs and adjust freely.

System 1: Simple, one-level

This system uses a flat list of broad categories with no hierarchy. It is deliberately minimal — every transaction gets a label, but you are not asked to make fine distinctions. You will not have the granularity for detailed sub-reports, but you will build the habit of categorizing and get a clear picture of where your money broadly goes.

Best suited to: someone new to financial tracking, anyone who finds detailed structure overwhelming at first, or someone who wants rough awareness before deciding how deep to go.

Income

• Salary — your regular employment income, including any payroll bonuses.
• Other Income — side jobs, interest, occasional sales, or any irregular earnings that do not fit under Salary.

Expenses

• Housing — rent or mortgage payments; a single bucket for what it costs to live somewhere.
• Utilities — electricity, water, gas, and internet billed to your home.
• Groceries — supermarket and food-shop spending, including household basics you buy alongside food.
• Transportation — public transport passes, fuel, taxis, and any routine cost of getting around.
• Entertainment — dining out, subscriptions, hobbies, and anything you spend for leisure.
• Healthcare — doctor visits, prescriptions, and medical supplies.
• Insurance — home, vehicle, or life insurance premiums.
• Clothing — apparel and footwear for yourself or your household.

System 2: Balanced, two-level

This system introduces parent–child pairs. The parent categories give you the same broad view as System 1; the sub-categories let you see the breakdown without becoming overwhelming. This is the structure most regular YAFFA users find most useful for day-to-day tracking and monthly reviews.

Best suited to: someone who records transactions consistently, wants meaningful monthly reports, and is ready to spend a bit more time during entry in exchange for much richer insights.

Income

• Salary — Main Job · Bonuses
• Other Income — Side Job · Rental income

Expenses

• Housing — Rent/Mortgage · Maintenance and Repairs. Captures the cost of your home both as a fixed monthly payment and as the ongoing upkeep it requires.
• Utilities — Electricity · Water · Gas/Heating. Splitting these out makes it easy to notice seasonal patterns or unusual bills.
• Groceries — Food · Household Supplies. Separating food from cleaning products and similar items helps you track true food spend across a year.
• Transportation — Public Transport · Fuel · Vehicle Maintenance. You can see at a glance how much of your travel budget is fixed versus variable.
• Entertainment — Dining Out · Subscriptions · Events. Subscriptions are often invisible; a dedicated sub-category surfaces them.
• Healthcare — Doctor Visits · Medications · Health Insurance. Useful for tax purposes in many countries.
• Insurance — Home Insurance · Car Insurance. Separating insurances from other categories makes your fixed monthly commitments visible at a glance.
• Debt Repayment — Credit Cards · Loans. Tracking debt repayment separately from spending makes your true discretionary budget visible.

System 3: Comprehensive, two-level

System 3 is designed for users who want a complete picture of household finances. It covers more income types, breaks expenses into finer sub-categories, and adds areas — education, government benefits, miscellaneous — that most people need eventually but System 2 does not formally capture.

Best suited to: someone tracking a full household budget, managing multiple income sources, or someone who has outgrown a simpler system and wants their reports to reflect real spending patterns in precise detail.

Do not feel pressured to start here. It is much easier to expand from System 1 or 2 — using YAFFA's merge feature — than to maintain forty categories before you know which ones you actually use.

Income

• Salary — Main Job · Bonuses
• Other Income — Freelance Work · Rental Income
• Government Benefits — Child Allowance · Social Assistance. Worth tracking separately for household budgeting and for any means-testing context.

Expenses

• Housing — Rent · Property Taxes · Repairs and Maintenance · Home Improvements. Splitting ongoing repairs from deliberate improvements helps you see the difference between unavoidable cost and intentional investment.
• Utilities — Electricity · Gas/Heating · Water/Sewer · Internet/Cable.
• Groceries — Food · Household Products · Personal Care · Clothing. At this level, personal care and clothing sit here if you buy them at the same shops; promote them to their own parent if they become significant.
• Transportation — Car Payments · Public Transport · Fuel · Parking · Maintenance and Repairs. Parking is a surprisingly common hidden cost worth isolating.
• Entertainment & Leisure — Dining Out · Subscriptions · Hobbies and Activities · Vacations and Travel · Events.
• Healthcare — Doctor and Dentist Visits · Medications · Health Insurance Premiums · Vision and Dental Care. Separating insurance premiums from out-of-pocket costs is useful for comparing real healthcare spend year over year.
• Insurance — Home · Auto · Life · Disability.
• Debt Repayment — Credit Card · Student Loans · Personal Loans · Mortgage Overpayments.
• Education & Development — Courses and Training · Books and Supplies · School and University Fees. Often overlooked in simpler systems; tracking this separately helps you invest in it intentionally.
• Miscellaneous — Gifts and Donations · Pet Care · Fines · Legal Fees. A catch-all for spending that does not fit cleanly elsewhere. If one sub-category grows large, promote it to its own parent category.

Getting started in YAFFA

Whichever system you choose, the process is the same: create your categories — with an optional parent for each if you are using a two-level system — and start recording transactions. YAFFA learns from your entries and begins surfacing relevant category suggestions automatically, so the structure you build pays off every time you open the transaction form.

Starting simple and upgrading later

Many users start with System 1 and expand as they build confidence. When you decide to split a category — for example, dividing “Entertainment” into sub-categories — you can:

1. Create the new, more specific categories under the old one as a parent.
2. Start using the new sub-categories in new transactions immediately.
3. Use YAFFA's merge feature if you ever want to fold two sub-categories back together — it reassigns all historical transactions in a single step, with no data loss.

Categories you try and abandon

If a category turns out to be one you never actually use, mark it as inactive rather than deleting it. It disappears from your daily entry interface while keeping any past transactions it was part of fully intact and still visible in reports.

Set default categories for your payees

Once your category structure is in place, consider assigning default categories to your common payees. When you select a familiar payee during transaction entry, YAFFA pre-fills the category — turning your well-designed structure into a genuine time-saver on every transaction.