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I was a bit flummoxed right at the first example. You bought something at a bakery, so the balance in your credit card increased? It's right there in the increa

I was a bit flummoxed right at the first example. You bought something at a bakery, so the balance in your credit card increased? It's right there in the increased column. Surely it decreased to a larger negative number? (Credit card accounts are almost always negative, although mine occasionally goes slightly positive when I pay it off and round up to the next pound.) And why are the columns different to the example shown later for the checking account (or current account, as we say here in the UK)? You've got "increase" and "decrease" vs "deposit" and "withdrawal". Obviously you're likely to use your credit card and checking account in substantially different ways, but surely the fundamentals of transferring money in and out is similar enough that they ought to look the same in your finance software?

xupybd 6y ago
No a credit card is a line of credit so a more positive number is more debt you owe. Spending from it increases the balance. A savings account goes the other way. I don't know why but it's an accounting convention. Sometimes I think those conventions just exist to confuse people into needing an accountant.
aceofspades19 6y ago
Every credit card I have had shows the balance increasing every time you make a purchase with it, when you pay the bill, the balance decreases. None of my credit card accounts have ever shown a negative balance unless I over paid the bill.
growse 6y ago
The "credit card" account is a liability account, unlike a bank account which is an asset account. If you spend something on a credit card, your liability increases. > Credit card accounts are almost always negative This is only true if you think of them like a bank account. Every credit card statement I've ever receive has shown the amount I owe as a positive amount.
- quietbritishjim 6y ago
  > > Credit card accounts are almost always negative > This is only true if you think of them like a bank account. Every credit card statement I've ever receive has shown the amount I owe as a positive amount. I just checked my online banking - I bank with Nationwide, a UK building society (a bit like a US credit union but functions like a bank). In the main statement of accounts, which looks like this [1], the credit card balance is shown negative. So is my mortgage, which makes for a depressing overall sum! I won't bore you with more detail but generally they mostly stick to this pattern in other screens. Oddly, in that example screenshot, the credit card balance is shown as positive - I'm not sure if that's because it's just an example and they faked it wrongly or because the way balances are shown have changed since that picture was taken. I've never had a credit card with anyone else, so that's why I'm surprised that the debt is presented as a positive number. It's interesting to see (from your comment and others) that's it's normally done that way. My initial cynical reaction was that this is a marketing ploy to make you feel a bit less bad about it, and I'm not surprised that Nationwide doesn't follow suit given that it's not run for profit. [1] https://i0.wp.com/money-watch.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/nationwide-online-banking.png?w=512&ssl=1 https://i0.wp.com/money-watch.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/... > The "credit card" account is a liability account Interesting, thank you, I hadn't heard of "liability account" before. So it seems that it is something accountants really do use, not just the cynical marketing plot I initially thought. But it still does seem an unnecessary complication to me compared to just having all accounts working the same way (but some happen to be negative). Maybe it's a just mathematician / computer scientist thing of preferring things that make mathematical sense rather normal intuitive sense, a bit like zero-based indexing or end iterators that point one past the end.

xupybd 6y ago

No a credit card is a line of credit so a more positive number is more debt you owe. Spending from it increases the balance. A savings account goes the other way. I don't know why but it's an accounting convention. Sometimes I think those conventions just exist to confuse people into needing an accountant.

aceofspades19 6y ago

Every credit card I have had shows the balance increasing every time you make a purchase with it, when you pay the bill, the balance decreases. None of my credit card accounts have ever shown a negative balance unless I over paid the bill.

growse 6y ago

The "credit card" account is a liability account, unlike a bank account which is an asset account. If you spend something on a credit card, your liability increases. > Credit card accounts are almost always negative This is only true if you think of them like a bank account. Every credit card statement I've ever receive has shown the amount I owe as a positive amount.

quietbritishjim 6y ago
> > Credit card accounts are almost always negative > This is only true if you think of them like a bank account. Every credit card statement I've ever receive has shown the amount I owe as a positive amount. I just checked my online banking - I bank with Nationwide, a UK building society (a bit like a US credit union but functions like a bank). In the main statement of accounts, which looks like this [1], the credit card balance is shown negative. So is my mortgage, which makes for a depressing overall sum! I won't bore you with more detail but generally they mostly stick to this pattern in other screens. Oddly, in that example screenshot, the credit card balance is shown as positive - I'm not sure if that's because it's just an example and they faked it wrongly or because the way balances are shown have changed since that picture was taken. I've never had a credit card with anyone else, so that's why I'm surprised that the debt is presented as a positive number. It's interesting to see (from your comment and others) that's it's normally done that way. My initial cynical reaction was that this is a marketing ploy to make you feel a bit less bad about it, and I'm not surprised that Nationwide doesn't follow suit given that it's not run for profit. [1] https://i0.wp.com/money-watch.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/nationwide-online-banking.png?w=512&ssl=1 https://i0.wp.com/money-watch.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/... > The "credit card" account is a liability account Interesting, thank you, I hadn't heard of "liability account" before. So it seems that it is something accountants really do use, not just the cynical marketing plot I initially thought. But it still does seem an unnecessary complication to me compared to just having all accounts working the same way (but some happen to be negative). Maybe it's a just mathematician / computer scientist thing of preferring things that make mathematical sense rather normal intuitive sense, a bit like zero-based indexing or end iterators that point one past the end.