SEE Finance 2 4+

Good, but….

For many years, I’ve used MoneyWell for all my financial bookkeeping. Once they eliminated the Dropbox sync capability, I needed an app that would sync between my Mac and my iPhone 8 Plus, and SEE Finance 2 fit that bill. So far, the app has worked perfectly. It handles all my financial demands with ease and keeps me well organized. The only gripes I have about the app is that there is no ability to add notes to transactions. I use this to write confirmation and invoice numbers when doing direct internet payments to payees. Also, I would love to see the ability to add check numbers to check transactions. I can almost bet other users would like the ability to add notes and check numbers to transactions. I don’t like that I have to go back to my checkbook to see what check number went to what payee. Overall, SEE seems to be a well designed and capable application for personal finance tracking. If the developers would change these two things, for myself anyway, it would be a FIVE STAR rating.

Developer Response ,

There’s several optional table columns you can add to the Transactions table using the program’s View->Columns menu. You can add the Memo, Number, and Check # columns to view and set those transaction values. The Number column is intended for transaction numbers such as invoice numbers in addition to also being able to set the check number. Note that we plan on adding some means to be able to view/set less often used transaction settings which you don’t want to always keep a column shown for.

Not as good as previous version

I love version 1.0 of this app. I enthusiastically upgraded to 2.0. However, I am finiding it is missing some key features from the previous version and is comparativly buggy. Some examples:
(1) Importing stock transactions from a csv could not detect the stock symbols in the file,. The file format worked fine in the prior version. Transactions were imported without a security. Weirdly, the app created a new security for each one in the file with the same name.
(2) Sync with the mobile app has overwritten local changes from the icloud. A dialog did appear asking me to pick a version but it has a bug and seems to close before I picked the file to use. There automatic backup doesn’t seem to exist anymore so if you do have a sync conflict, you can’t recover to the prior version.
(3) Various UI gaps: You can’t see the securities in an individual account, only a composite view across all accounts. Alt-click menus are gone. Reports are not imported from your 1.0 file. The transaction data entry gadget is akward and missing the fields for the prior version,.
Overall, it is real a downgrade in the experience form the prior product. They should have waited to release. The 1.0 prouct is great. 2.0 is middling and frustrating, but shows promise. I’m hoping a 2.1 will be out soon that is robust enought to use.

Developer Response ,

Keep in mind that version 2 is a completely new program built from scratch and not directly related to the previous versions in any way. It is a whole new foundation for us to build on. As with any new program there’s inevitably bugs that are discovered once it gets put into wide use. Our top priority is squashing any of bugs found in the all new program and then we will begin adding some new features.

Regarding your specific concerns/issues:

1). For importing into the program, CSV files are the file type of last resort. If you have the option to import any other file type it would be a better option. That said, it appears to be a bug where the security is not being set when importing investment transactions from a CSV file. This is already fixed for the next update.

2). We have worked really hard to get the new program to sync reliably while also allowing the user to retain complete control over the location of their data. The program can and does attempt to merge conflicting versions of a file on its own if that is possible. As described, there was some kind of conflict with your file and you were presented to resolve that conflict on iOS. However, before you had the chance to resolve the conflict on iOS that conflict was already resolved somehow. That’s the only reason the conflict view asking you to pick a version would be removed. Most likely the Mac version resolved the issue by merging changes in the conflicted versions on its own and nothing was lost.

Note that you do need to keep your own backup files as the new program doesn’t have an automatic backup feature. We might add one in the future, but it is not decided how or when they might be implemented.

3). We plan on adding a “Holdings” section to individual investment accounts in an upcoming update. Currently, individual investment holding information can be viewing in an Investment Values report on the account in the new program.

It’s not clear which contextual (alt click) menus are no longer available that you’re looking for, but we plan on adding more contextual menu options throughout the program.

In the new program you record transactions in a table view or you can also record them in the new calendar view. With the table view, its uses inline transaction entry as opposed to the old version’s form based entry. You may need to add optional table columns for less often used settings such as memos and check numbers. In version 2, accessing optional columns can be done using the program’s View -> Columns menu as well as by holding down the Control key and clicking on the table. Note that we plan on adding some means to be able to view/set less often used transaction settings which you don’t want to always keep a column shown for.

Feel free to submit questions and/or specific feature requests to us directly if you haven’t done so already.

New to Mac

I started using Mac about a year ago. Tried using Quicken at first. Not very user friendly/compatiable with Mac like it was with MS. This is a very good compromise. Does everything that Quicken does (and for less annual money). I have not had any issues with any of the financial institutions that I've been downloading from. I have not tried it with the IOS version (through cloud) don't think I will. So far only have one complaint.
Sometimes I download directly from my financial institution and sometimes import from the app. I noticed that importing/downloading from both (maybe days apart) SEE Finance 2 will double up some of the entries. Maybe because it doesn't recognize the other way it was brought in. Not a deal breaker though just a learning curve and sometimes some deletion for duplicate entries.