Spending Summary
A spending summary totals transactions over a period, grouped either by vendor or by ledger category, while explicitly reporting how much spending was left out because it hasn't been categorized yet.
In short
"Where did the money go," answered two ways: by vendor (normalized descriptions, works regardless of categorization status) or by category (only sees transactions actually categorized, with the leftover amount reported separately rather than folded in silently). Income is excluded from both — it's a spending report, not a cash-flow one.
Also called: spending breakdown, spend by category
A spending summary answers the question people actually ask, which is rarely "show me every transaction" — it's "how much did we spend, and on what." Grouping by vendor normalizes descriptions so store numbers and formatting differences collapse into one line, working directly off the transaction description regardless of whether anything has been categorized yet.
Grouping by category rolls spending up by the ledger account each transaction was actually posted to, and this mode has a real limitation worth understanding before presenting a number from it: it can only see transactions that have actually been categorized. If half of a category's charges are still sitting unposted in the inbox, category grouping only totals the categorized half — the rest is invisible to it, not zero-dollar.
The response calls this out directly with an excluded-uncategorized figure showing both the count and dollar amount left out of the category totals. That number is worth checking before treating a category total as the complete picture, since a large excluded figure means real spending is missing from what's shown, not that it didn't happen.
Income is excluded from both grouping modes entirely — a spending summary is specifically about outgoing money, not a net cash-flow report, so a deposit or a refund never shows up in either the vendor or category totals it produces.
What people get wrong
- Trusting a category total without checking the excluded-uncategorized figure reported alongside it — real spending can be missing from that total, not zero.
- Expecting a spending summary to include income or refunds — both grouping modes are spending-only by design.
- Confusing vendor grouping (works regardless of categorization status) with category grouping (only sees categorized transactions) as if they had the same limitations.
Common questions
- Why doesn't my category total match what I know I spent?
- Check the excluded-uncategorized figure — category grouping only totals transactions that have actually been categorized, and reports anything left out separately rather than folding it in as zero.
- Does a spending summary include income?
- No — both grouping modes exclude income entirely. It's specifically a spending report, not a net cash-flow one.
Machine-readable: /api/knowledge/concept:spending-summary