How to Create a Personal Bill Payment Spreadsheet

Creating a personal bill payment spreadsheet can be a very good decision because you will be able to track your expenses systematically. You will have information in your fingertips in seconds and you will also be able to analyze your financial pattern over a period of time.

Things You'll Need

• Excel Software
• Quick Books software

Instructions

The Process

1. Open the spreadsheet such as Microsoft Excel or some such program. Make sure you put a title like 'personal bill payment record of _ (name)and (month) ' and save the document. You can also use software products such as Quickbooks, but Excel is more user friendly and easier to use.

2. Make two columns with following entries: column 1. Approx. Due Date (Excel Column width: 10), column 2, Creditor (Excel column width: 40)

3. Make two more columns with following entries: column 3, Amount Due ( Excel column width 12), column 4, Amount Paid ( Excel column width 12)

4. Make two more columns with following entries: column 3, Amount Due ( Excel column width 12), column 4, Amount Paid ( Excel column width 12)

5. Make two final columns: column 5, Date Paid ((Excel column width: 13); column 6, type Chk or Reference Number (Excel column width: 13).

6. Make three work sheets: Sheet 1 should be for essentials, where you put things like payment to employees or servants, grocery and food, bills (mostly credit card and phone bills), rent, investments, car and fuel as the entries. Sheet 2 should contain non-essentials like recreation travel, gifts, luxury item bought, long distance calls etc and Sheet 3 should contain savings or charity amounts. Feel free to add or remove any row that you think is relevant.

Tips & Warnings

• Make use of a highlighter and mark the expenses that you think are on the higher side and can be reduced.

• Keep monthly personal bill payment spreadsheets. Glance at three months performance of how payments are being paid and what charges are going on the higher side and how certain payments can be controlled to get grip on a tighter, smart budget allocation.

• If there was money spent for emergencies or certain extras make a note of it. You can also show this file to financial planner in case you want insights on personal budget financing.

• If you have supporting data in the form of receipts, statements, do not discard them thinking that you have stuff stored in the spreadsheet. Discarding them quickly may lead to confusion. So hold on to them (the important ones, obviously) for six months or so. Protect the document with a password, if you do not want to share this document.

References

• Create spreadsheet