Other Features

View Change History

Whenever changes are made to a transaction (eg. data is added or removed, transaction is split or grouped, transaction is linked to a recurring item, etc.), those changes are saved in a change log with a timestamp. This is helpful when you wish to confirm if a change was made and when (eg. if a change was automatically applied based on a Rule).

How to view a transaction’s change history

1) Open the Transactions page

2) Click the arrow to the right of the transaction row to open the Transaction Details panel

3) Scroll down to the I want to... section and click on "View change history", which will open the “Transaction Change History” panel, showing the most recent change at the top.

Exporting Transactions

Transaction data can be downloaded from Lunch Money in CSV file format. The CSV file will be created with all transactions within the active visible view. If you are on a filtered view, the CSV file created will only contain the transactions from that filtered view.

The CSV file exported will include the following columns: Date, Category, Payee, Amount, Currency, Notes, Tags, Account Name, Original Name (if split or grouped), Transaction number, Type (split, group, or recurring), Parent ID (if split), and Recurring ID (if linked to a Recurring Item).

How to export a CSV file with transaction data

Exporting a CSV file is done via the Transactions page:

First, make sure that all transactions that you’d like to export are displaying in the current table view
On the far right of the screen, above the table, click on the Export to CSV icon. The download will begin immediately and save to your computer.

Filters

Applying filters on the Transactions page is a way to search and achieve a view that will only include transactions based on defined conditions. Filtering will hide irrelevant data from the table, so that you can work with a curated list of transactions.

There are three main ways to filter transactions: Quick search, Quick filter, and Advanced Filter.

Quick Search

The quick search is located right above the Transactions table. The quick search can be used to get a quick filtered view of transactions that correspond with the search value entered.

For example:

“Groceries” to filter all transactions in the Groceries category
“24.99” to filter all transactions with an amount of 24.99
“Netflix” to filter all transactions with “Netflix” as the payee name

If the search term is found in multiple fields (eg. Payee and Notes), both matching transactions will appear in the filtered table view.

Quick Filter

The quick filter is located right above the Transactions table, next to the quick search bar. This is a dropdown menu that includes some of the most common time frame filter options. The active month’s view will always appear first in the list, followed by the previous month, the current year, last year, and an All Time filter:

Advanced Filter

The advanced filter tool is very powerful and allows for a combination of many different parameters in order to achieve a filtered view of the exact transactions you are looking for.

The advanced filter option is accessed by clicking on the "Filters" button, located on the right side of the page above the 'Review Transactions' section.

Once clicked, the advanced filter setup dialog will appear. At the top of the setup dialog, you can select whether you want the filter to match with all or any defined conditions. At the bottom of the setup dialog, you will select the time frame within which you want to search (clicking on the dropdown menu will also allow you to set a custom range).

To add a condition, click on the "Choose filter" dropdown menu and set the value. To add another filter, click on “Add another filter” or the duplicate button next to the dropdown menu.

To remove a condition, click the red 'x' button.

Sorting (Ascending / Descending)

The data in each column in the table can be sorted by ascending or descending alphabetical or numerical order. To sort the data, simply click on the header of the column. The first click will sort by descending order, and clicking again will sort by ascending order.

Show / Hide Columns

In some cases, you may want to hide certain columns from the Transactions table in order to have a cleaner view of the transaction data. In Lunch Money, you have the option to hide the Notes, Accounts, and Tags columns from view.

Toggling to show or hide columns from view is done via the Transactions page, by hovering over the Options button on the far right side of the screen, above the table.

In addition to toggling the columns to show or hide from view, if you have more than one tag for some of your transactions, you can choose whether you’d like to see all tags in the table, or just one of the tags.

Deduplication Tool

In some cases, you may find duplicate transactions appearing on the Transactions page. To easily go through duplicates and remove them, we recommend using the Deduplication tool.

The Deduplication Tool will search through the active transaction list view to locate similar transactions based on your choice of 2 or more criteria. With that said, it is recommended to use at least 3 criteria to get the most accurate results.

Some things to keep in mind:

The Deduplication Tool is a one-time action, meaning that it will not continue running in the background. If you wish to run a new search in a different filtered view (eg. for a different month), you will need to change the view first, and then rerun the Deduplication Tool again.
The Deduplication Tool will only search through standalone transactions. Split or grouped transactions are skipped and not taken into account when searching for duplicates.
The Deduplication Tool will only select the duplicate items, but not automatically delete them. You will be able to decide what you wish to do with the selected Transactions.

Always double-check before deleting as you may have legitimate multiples of the same transaction!

How to use the Deduplication Tool:

Open the Transactions page
Set the transaction list to a filtered view in which you'd like to search, as the Deduplication Tool will only process through transactions on the active filtered view (eg. if the view is set to "May 2024", the Deduplication Tool will only search through transactions in that month).

If you wish to look for duplicates across multiple months or with the "All time" filter, make sure to select "Date" as one of the criteria on step 4 below, to lower the risk of legitimate transactions being marked as duplicates.

Click on the Options icon on the right side of the page, and then click on "Deduplicate transactions" at the bottom of the menu:

In the dialogue window that appears, you will now select 2-4 criteria to be used to identify the duplicate transactions: Date, Account, Amount and Payee. It is recommended to select at least 3 values for effective results.

Next, you will select whether you wish to keep the most recently added transaction or the earliest added transaction for any duplicates:

"Most recently added" vs. "earliest added" refers to when the transaction was created within Lunch Money, not the date of when the transaction took place. This is important to consider if you already had transactions in Lunch Money and suddenly see duplicates. Selecting to "keep the earliest added transaction" will remove all the duplicates that suddenly appeared, based on when they were added to Lunch Money, keeping the original transactions.

Click on "Select transactions to delete" to continue. You will now return to the list of transactions and if any duplicates were found, you will also see transactions selected for deletion.

Pay attention to the "Selected transactions" box on the right side of the screen to see how many transactions are selected and make sure to carefully review all of them to ensure there are no legitimate multiples of the same transaction.