Another office supply I can't show you a picture of

I try many office products because I'm always looking for ways to organize my work better.  Some are great, like the Post-It Weekly Planner.  Some work well but they're too cute--as if the designer would rather make the page pretty than present a more logical way for me to store my information.

I recently bought an Organizher budget planner from Mead Westvaco, mostly because I like Flex binders and because who doesn't feel that they could have a better handle on their expenses?

The pages are attractive, all right, but they didn't seem to fit my needs.  The packaging said I could visit the Mead website for more downloadable pages. 

When I went online, the extra pages weren't available, so I shot them a little email.  I was surprised and pleased today when they sent me back their templates.

I can't show them to you here, because I can't figure out how to display PDFs.  Let me describe the expense sheet to you.  It has five charming columns headed in lovely feminine scripts:

expense/amount/date paid/check no./confirmation no 

It's a handwritten log of expenses sorted by date, like my check register.

Darn!  I was hoping for something that would help me organize my finances.  The appealing page design was just supposed to help me get in the mood.

So I sent them these helpful suggestions:

 

The templates you sent are pretty, but I assume that an Organizher customer is buying the book to put her budget in order.  These templates seem to assume that the customer already has a budget and is merely tracking expenses. 

Selling a beginner a pretty book doesn’t help her.  She throws up her hands and says, “I spent $15 on this book and it looks like so much work.  I knew I couldn’t do this budget thing.”

What you want her to say is “Gosh, this book is really helping me get my budget on track.  I should tell all my friends about it.”

And it does look like a lot of work.  I assume that the buyer isn’t paying cash, but is using a credit card at Target—the only place you sell it.   That’s where I got my planner, and on the same trip I bought gifts and laundry detergent.  This makes it more work to track expenses by category.  If she’s paying by check, why would she want to record the purchase both on your budget sheets and in the check register?

Suggestions:

I suggest one or two pages at the beginning of the book explaining how to draw up a budget, the way the Franklin Covey planners do.  If she doesn’t need them, she’ll throw them out.  Be encouraging so the beginner will feel that she can do it.

“Congratulations on buying this book to put your budget in order. Don’t be intimidated by planning a budget.  It doesn’t have to be perfect, although you’ll get better with practice.  Use rough numbers.  All you need is an idea of how much money you have, so you’ll be better prepared for unexpected things that may affect your spending.”

Use the next page to plan your overall expenses for the year. 

The budget plan should have a large and inviting space at the top for the buyer to record her financial goals, i.e., pay off MasterCard balance, take family to Disneyland, buy a new car.  Asking her to dream first is an invitation to step into the budget process.

Then she records her expenses.  Fixed expenses (mortgage/rent, commuting, utilities) are usually easy, but variable expenses are rougher.

“Don’t know how much you spend on gas, utilities, groceries?  Carry this book with you for one month and write down every purchase.”  Carrying the book around for the whole year sounds like a lot of work.  A month sounds doable.

After getting a rough idea of expenses, and multiplying by 12, the customer can go back to trying to make a budget plan for the year.

“Subtract expenses from income to get an idea of where your budget is heading.  Now figure out roughly how much your financial goals will cost and divide by the number of months until you want to achieve them.”

When the budget goals are set, the purpose of the receipt folders becomes clearer.  Stuff all the receipts in the folder and figure out where the money went at the end of the week or the end of the month.  After lugging the book around for a month, this’ll seem like a huge time saver. 

The folders could also have spaces for writing in purchases without receipts, i.e., tolls, vending machine purchases, etc.  Note that if she writes on the folders she can’t reuse them next year.  She has to buy a new budget planner or at least new folders.

Every year at tax time at my house, we scramble to figure out our deductible expenses.  A sheet to track these (there usually aren’t that many)—and maybe an extra folder for those receipts--would probably be a big help.  I would certainly use it.

The websites sheet is just plain silly.  Who wants to keep a written list and then retype URLs into their browser every time except people on public computers?  It would be better to write two lines about learning how to bookmark, and then send her online to find budget templates that fit her situation.   

Don’t assume that everyone has internet access, of course; tell her that there are perfectly fine books at the library.  The basics of budgeting don’t change.

Internet users might want to see Microsoft’s budget templates at

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/templates/CL102207099.aspx (must use IE to download) and I’m sure there are other good ones as well.

See also http://www.iseek.org/iseek/static/Budgeting_10.pdf

# # #

I'm sure Mead will appreciate my help just as much as all the other consumer products manufacturers I  send suggestions to...  But, really, just because I'm a woman doesn't mean I want to sacrifice function for form.