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1990-05-28
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PERSONAL BUDGET TOOLS USER MANUAL
Rickenbacker Software
_________________________________________________________________
CUSTOMER SERVICE
If you encounter any problems with this program, please write
me. I'll respond as quickly as possible. (In fairness both to my
family and to my pretensions at having a life independent of the
computer, I cannot offer telephone support. Rickenbacker Software
remains a part-time, one-man operation with a tad more success than
I bargained for. So, time is too tight for a phone operation.)
Although the lack of telephone support is a bit bush (How did our
ancestors come along with this term before George?), I do respond
promptly and thoroughly to questions. I shall get back to you,
usually within two weeks, with an answer, a circumvention, or a
fix. Do remember to provide your address. Optionally, provide
your phone number and those times that you prefer to receive calls.
On rare occasion, it is necessary to make a call.
It goes without saying, so I'll say it, that it's to your advantage
to make your question clear and to provide me with as much
background information as you can. For example, I recently
received a letter from someone who claimed that the F1 key didn't
work for him in Check King. I took my best shots at guessing what
he meant, but I must confess that I still don't have a clue to
what problem he may have experienced. Is his copy of the program
defective? Is his F1 key defective? Did he try to get help from
one of the few places where it isn't available -- such as from the
Main Menu. I don't know. So, I addressed each possibility I could
think of and probably failed to address the real problem anyway.
If you are not registered, your request for help will still be
handled but on a catch-as-catch-can basis. Queries from non-
registered users must be accompanied by a self-addressed stamped
envelope.
First Edition, September 1989
(c) 1989 Rickenbacker Software
All Rights Reserved
Rickenbacker Software
Box 11662
Newington, CT 06111
Program and Manual Written by Tom Rickenbacker
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE 1
HOW TO USE THE PBT 2
WHAT THE PBT IS 4
WHAT THE PBT IS NOT 5
GETTING STARTED 7
TERMINOLOGY 8
THE MAIN MENU 9
THE FILES SUBMENU 10
Overview 10
New 10
Load 10
Rename 10
Save 10
Exit 11
Quit 11
PBT'S FILE HANDLING 12
THE EXPENSE SUBMENU 13
Overview 13
Weekly Expenses 13
Monthly Expenses 13
Annual Expenses 13
THE CALCULATORS SUBMENU 15
THE PBT ANALYSIS 17
Printing the analysis on non-EPSON compatible printers 17
APPENDIX A - Types of Savings 19
APPENDIX B - NAVIGATION 20
APPENDIX C - QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 21
How did you arrive at the minimum short term savings figure? 21
Why did you subtract out the lowest month? 21
Is it safe to borrow from Peter to pay Paul? 21
What formula did you use for the mortgage calculator? 22
What formula did you use for the installment loan calculator? 22
Where is the documentation on your error messages? 22
Why don't get the HELP INDEX when I press F1 from within help? 22
Who would benefit most from the PBT? 23
What happened to the display of my expenses? 23
APPENDIX D - VERSION HISTORY 24
APPENDIX E - ABOUT SHAREWARE 25
APPENDIX F - REASONS TO REGISTER 27
Registration Form 28
PREFACE
Welcome to Personal Budget Tools (i.e., PBT).
The PBT provides:
an analysis of your expenses featuring:
- a one-page overview of your financial
situation.
- a month-by-month analysis showing:
- the minimum amount which you must have in
short-term savings to meet your annual
obligations.
- the bills coming due in a given month and how
to allocate your PHD (explained later) and
short-term savings to meet them.
and specialized one-purpose calculators to do what-if
comparisons for mortgage and installment loans.
The PBT answers such questions as:
How much must I put aside to meet my short-term
obligations?
How much of my savings is already spent?!
How much more would I have to pay each month if I take
out a 25-year mortgage instead of a 30-year mortgage?
How much less will my total payments be?
If I manage to scrape up an additional $1,000 for a
down payment, how much will I save on my monthly
payment? How much will I save on interest charges
over the length of the loan?
Do I have enough in short-term savings to cover those
bills which roll around in August? How short am I?
Or, how much of a buffer is in my short-term savings?
These are questions you could answer without the PBT. But,
not so easily! And, if it isn't easy, do you bother?
1
HOW TO USE THE PBT
The PBT breaks away from what many of us have considered
budgeting. If you want to find out whether the PBT "got it
right," then you can't just tinker with it. That would be to
measure it against your preconceptions.
You'll have to give it a real go. USE IT. Then, judge it on
the basis of whether or not it provides useful, accurate
information in a form which is meaningful to you. (Let's
get this right. I said, "useful, accurate information" in a
meaningful form. I did NOT say "information in the form you
were expecting.")
I'll bet that you expected to set up accounts, to fuss
around with Actuals vs. Budgeted (i.e., "Who do I yell at for
this mess?), and to hobby around with lots of numbers in columns.
Heck, that's not budgeting. That's playing a two-part
game: PRETEND (or "Setting Up Budget") and AGONIZE (or "Why
can't we get this right, Alice?")
Forget PRETEND AND AGONIZE. It's a loser. It hasn't worked
in the past. There is no reason to expect it to work in the
future.
Do this instead. Take advantage of the Help Screens (F1) to
jog your memory about your various expenses.
1. Fire up the PBT.
2. Enter all the weekly bills (i.e. expenses) that you
can think of under the Weekly Expenses.
3. Enter all the monthly bills that you can think of
under the Monthly Expenses.
4. Enter all the annual, quarterly, semi-annual bills
that you can think of under Annual Expenses. Also,
enter their Due Months. Yes, accuracy counts.
5. Print off the analysis.
You now have a useful, but probably inaccurate, report. It's
useful because it shows you the way off the financial roller
coaster. It's inaccurate because you didn't get it all right
the first time. You left some items out. You put down some
incorrect amounts. You put in some incorrect Due Months.
That's OK. It's an ITERATIVE PROCESS. (Thank you, Storm
Connors, for pointing this out.) You don't gotta do it perfect
to have a useful report.
2
Let's say that two months from now you get hit on by your
Public TV Station. You've been supporting it, but you forgot
to include your $25 annual gift under May's annual expenses.
Fine. Add it. Rerun the analysis.
Four months from now you take your mother and father out for
their anniversary, as you've been doing for the last three
years. The tab for you, your spouse, and them comes to $80.
Add "Anniversary" to Annual Expenses under July. Put down $92
(you tipped, didn't you!!). Rerun the analysis.
By this time next year, the PBT's analysis will as "on the
money" as you might wish. Better still, the initial analysis
(which will already be for many people the best analysis
they've yet made of their finances) was immediately useful;
and, it got better each month!
Give the PBT an evening to gather and enter the initial
information when you first get it. Be as thorough and as
accurate as you can, but relax. You need not be perfect the
first time.
Then, each month thereafter, give the PBT just ten
minutes. "LOAD" in your data, update it, print out your updated
analysis. Your total investment in time: a. up to four hours
for your first PBT session plus b. two hours more spread over
the following eleven months.
Not bad!
3
What the PBT Is
The PBT is a razor -- a tool to cut away clutter and to
reveal the essence of a budget: control of expenses.
Since conventional wisdom would have you setting up
accounts and jumping through hoops, let me repeat it.
Your major budgeting goal is to control your expenses. Period.
Controlling expenses is a two part process.
Part I - Identify the expenses.
Part II - Identify how you will meet the expenses.
The PBT will help with these two essentials and make it look
easy. It is. The tough part is never answering questions.
The tough part is asking the RIGHT questions.
The analysis provided by the PBT is so logical and so clear
that it may tempt you to undervalue it. Groucho Marx quipped
that he wouldn't join any club which lacked the good taste to
reject him. Similarly, some reject a tool which is as
accessible as the PBT's analysis. Shouldn't there be more to
it?
No, the trick isn't making up a To Do List. Such lists are
the intellectual equivalent of Fool's Gold. The pay off
is in asking the RIGHT questions and in digging in the right spots.
Or, to keep the mining metaphor going, the amount of gold you get is
determined by where you dig not by how much you dig. (Some people
NEVER figure this out!)
4
What the PBT Is Not
1. It is not hobbyware.
You'll enter your expenses into the PBT one time, save
those expenses, and occasionally modify your file as you
identify changes or inaccuracies in the data you first
entered.
The most useful part of the PBT is its report: a one page
overview, six pages showing your month-by-month activity,
and listings of your weekly and monthly expenses. Most
people will be managing their budgets better than ever by
simply using the report to manage their PHD.
In addition to its major function of helping you to take
control of your expenses, the PBT offers two calculators
which you'll probably want to fire up the next time that
you're about to charge a major purchase or take out a
mortgage.
2. It's not an accounting package.
For most individuals, it is unnecessary torment to get
enmeshed in the caring and feeding of an accounting system.
Your goal is to get on top of things, not to get into the
thick of them.
3. It's not a system for tracking "actual" vs. "planned".
If you've run the PBT analysis, you know what you
"planned." Without finagling with a computer, you can
quickly see whether you spent more than you planned.
Besides, Check King provides several reports on what you
spent.
If you spent more than you planned, the interesting question
is, "Why did you spend more?" That is a question which no
program will answer for you.
If you spent more on a whim, do you want to add a whim
factor to your stated expenses? Do you want to add Whim
as an expense category? Or, do you simply want to know
that you spent something for which you didn't plan?
On the other hand, when you find that you simply forgot to
enter an expense into the PBT, then add the expense and
rerun PBT analysis. After you make all your significant
expenses known to the PBT, you'll find that you'll no
longer be getting blindsided by your bills. (Isn't it a
bit crazy to be surprised each year by your car tax or your
life insurance bill?)
5
4. It's not an investment vehicle and it doesn't track income.
If you're having trouble in keeping track of the money
which is rolling in, you need an accountant, an investment
banker, or investment software -- not a personal budget
tool.
Whether your income comes from a paycheck or from
dividends, the PBT tells you what you need to know -- when
your expenses come due and, month by month, the minimum
amount you need to have in savings. So, when you clip your
coupons or get your dividend checks, you need only compare
what you have already put aside to what you need to put
aside. Then, draw the obvious conclusions. (QUIZ: You
need to have $750 in short-term savings and have only $500.
Where should you place $250 immediately?) If money isn't
available for deposit, will it become available before it
is needed for an annual expense? If so, O.K. If not, it's
time to look at loans, at expense reduction, at increasing
income. A program would be presumptuous in the extreme
were it to attempt to solve such dilemmas for you.
I suppose I'll be hearing some counter arguments, but I
believe that there is little to be gained by having you
enter your income into the computer.
6
Getting Started
The Personal Budget Tools (PBT) distribution disk consists of:
1. A "GO.EXE" file which provides a quick overview of the
PBT along with the installation instructions.
2. PBT.EXE - The Personal Budget Tools program itself.
3. PBTHELP.HLP - The text for the PBT help system (in binary
format to save space).
4. DDS.INP - The text file which is read by the GO.EXE
program.
5. PBTMAN.DOC - This file.
6. PRINTMAN.BAT - A file which may be used to print this
manual.
7. ELITE.EXE - A program to set your EPSON or EPSON
compatible printer to Elite (12 cpi)
type before you print the manual. On
dot matrix printers, this type tends to
look more attractive than PICA.
Install the PBT by copying PBT.EXE and PBT.HLP to the floppy
diskette or to the hard disk directory from which you wish to
run the PBT. The distribution disk itself will become your
backup copy.
After installing the PBT, give it a spin. Enter "PBT" from
the working copy which you just installed. Try it out using
the One Page Manual (PBT1PG.DOC). Then, after gaining some
familiarity with it, read through this manual for fine points,
tips, and for an example of highly formal technical writing.
(Writing teachers assure me that with my manuals alone they can
provide a class with a full semester's worth of DON'Ts.)
7
TERMINOLOGY
Bill - Used somewhat interchangeably (and carelessly) with
"expense" in this manual.
Expense - Uses somewhat interchangeably (and carelessly)
with "bill" in this manual.
Main Menu - The PBT Main Menu is the horizontal bar menu with
choices of "FILES," "EXPENSES," "CALCULATORS,"
"ANALYSIS," and "HELP."
SubMenu - The SubMenus are the vertical menus which appear
when you select a choice from the Main Menu.
Hobbyware - Software designed to satisfy its owner's desire to
futz around vs. software designed to provide
solutions which are as simple to learn and to use
as possible.
Hobbyware does well in the hands of reviewers who
evaluate via checklists or in the hands of users
who consider the subject of the software good
hobby material. KISSware does well in the
hands of reviewers who don't confuse simplicity
with simplistic and with users who consider the
subject more a task than an amusement.
(I never use this term anywhere else in the manual,
but it was fun to coin and define it.)
KISSware - Software which subscribes to the KEEP IT SWEET and
SIMPLE solution. The PBT and Check King are, I
dare hope, KISSware.
Prudently Held Dollars (PHDs) - The dollars from which one pays
quarterly, semi-annual, and annual bills. Also,
the dollars from which one deposits into Short Term
Savings. (As the analysis will point out, not all
PHDs make it into short term savings. Some go
immediately to cover expenses.)
Short Term Savings - For the purposes of this program, short
term savings are monies put aside to cover
quarterly, semi-annual, and annual expenses.
One expects such savings to be spent within a
calendar year of the time they are deposited.
Intermediate Savings - Earmarked savings for purchases which
one expects to make within 13 months to 3 years.
Long Term Savings - Savings which one does not expect to tap
for at least 3 years.
8
The Main Menu
The PBT Main Menu is the horizontal bar menu with options of
"FILES," "EXPENSES," "CALCULATORS," "ANALYSIS," and "HELP."
When you enter the PBT, the "Expenses" and "Analysis" options
are not available. They are dimmed and the cursor will not
move to them. This is because a work file must be available
in which to record the expenses. To activate all the menu
options, you must first go to the FILES SubMenu and either
create a new file or load an existing one. (See THE FILES
SUBMENU.)
If you wish to use only the calculators of the Calculators
option, you need not open a file. The calculators are always
available. (See THE CALCULATORS SUBMENU.)
You may activate an option's SubMenu either by moving the
cursor to the desired option and pressing "Enter" or by typing
in the highlighted letter of the option. The second method
saves one or more keystrokes, so I'll refer to it as the
QuickKey method. The highlighted letter is usually the first
letter but not necessarily.
You may return to the Main Menu from anywhere within the PBT by
pressing <ESC> one or more times. After you request an
analysis, however, the <ESC> key is inactive until the
analysis is completed.
9
The Files SubMenu
Overview
--------
The Files SubMenu is not only the place from which you
manipulate the files used by the program but also the place
from which you may leave the program.
The options available from this SubMenu are: <N>ew, <L>oad,
<R>ename, <S>ave, e<X>it, and <Q>uit. Until you open a file
with "New" or "Load" the "Rename," "Save," and "eXit" options
are unavailable. Thereafter, the "New" and "Load" options are
unavailable.
Originally, I had the "E" rather than the "X" of "e<X>it" as
its quick key. After the fourth or fifth time that I exited
the program when I wished to go to the Expense SubMenu, I
finally took the hint.
The PBT files must be in the same directory as the PBT program
itself.
<N>ew
Pick this option when you are creating a new file in which
to save your expense information. The file's extension is
automatically provided and is always "PBT". So, if you
create a file called, say, "George," the file's actual name
will be "GEORGE.PBT."
If a file called "GEORGE.PBT" already exists, you would be
given a chance to reconsider before the program overlays
the file.
<L>oad
Pick this option to load in the data from an expense file
which you already created. When you select this option,
the program divides into two windows. The first window
displays all files within the directory which have an
extension of "PBT".
Should you enter the name of a file which does NOT already
exist, the PBT creates a new file for you using the name
you provided.
<R>ename
RENAME renames the file in memory. Any pre-existing file
with the original name is unaffected. The new name will be
used when you issue your next Save or when you Exit the
program. The RENAME does NOT create a file under the new
name until you issue a subsequent Save or eXit. (See PBT's
File Handling.)
10
<S>ave
The SAVE causes the contents of memory to be written out to
disk. Changes which you make to your weekly, monthly, and
annual expenses aren't recorded to disk until you either
save them with this option or until you eXit the program.
When you save a file, you remain within the PBT after the
save.
e<X>it
Exit combines the SAVE function with the Quit function. It
causes the contents of memory to be written out to disk and
leaves the PBT.
<Q>uit
Use this option to leave the program without saving any
changes which were made after your last Save. If no SAVES
were issued prior to a Quit, no file activity takes place.
11
PBT's File Handling
To keep data safe as possible, the PBT keeps its files
closed except when it is reading from them or writing to
them.
When you issue a New command, the PBT checks to see whether
a file already exists under the name you provide. If not,
the PBT makes a note to itself to use the filename you
provided when you request a SAVE or an EXIT. If a file
does already exist under the name you provided, the PBT
asks you whether you wish to overwrite the file. If you
reply that you don't wish to overwrite it, you are returned
to the Main Menu.
If you reply that you do wish to overwrite it, the PBT
makes a note to itself to reuse the filename you provided
when you request a SAVE or an EXIT. If, instead, you Quit
the program without first entering a SAVE, the original
file will remain intact.
Just before writing a file in response to a SAVE or an
EXIT, the PBT checks again to see whether a file already
exists with the same name as the Work File. If so, it
copies the existing file to filename.BAK. Therefore, you
can get back to the prior version of a file by renaming,
from DOS, the filename.BAK file to a new file called
xxxxxxxx.PBT.
12
The Expense SubMenu
Overview
---------
All expenses fit into one of the three expense choices:
weekly, monthly, and annual. The annual category includes
expenses which are quarterly (four annual entries), semi-annual
(2 annual entries) and annual.
Any bi-weekly expenses should be placed into either the weekly
category (halve the bi-weekly amount) or into the monthly
category (double the bi-weekly amount).
It IS important to include any sizable expenses.
It IS NOT advisable, however, to budget down to the toothpaste
level. Several items fall into, say, groceries. Several
others fall into such categories such as "Sundry" and
"Entertainment."
Each of the three expense categories (i.e., the weekly, the
monthly, and the annual) will allow up to 100 entries. If you
feel that you need more than 100 entries, the PBT is not now
and will not become the kind of program which you'll enjoy.
Your idea of budgeting and mine are far too far apart to
reconcile.
Weekly Expenses
You'll have 15 characters in which to describe each expense. I
do allow for cents as well as dollars, but I recommend that you
enter amounts in whole dollars to break yourself of the habit
of "sweating the small stuff." The program is just as happy
with cents as with dollars, but showing cents implies a more
tightly managed budget than anyone is likely to follow.
Monthly Expenses
See Weekly Expenses above.
Annual Expenses
Most of us do a pretty good job of handling our weekly and
monthly expenses. They occur frequently enough that they are
unable to "surprise" us.
But, the annual, quarterly, and semi-annual expenses tend to be
a different matter altogether. The PBT's value to you is
directly related to how thoroughly you fill out this screen.
The format difference between this screen and the weekly and
monthly screens is that this screen asks you to enter the due
month for the expense.
13
The due month may be any month from 0 to 12. 0 has a special
meaning. It makes the entire line into a comment entry.
Expenses with a zero due month are not added into the expense
total and are not reported on the Analysis report.
Why would anyone enter an expense with a "0" in due month?
This is an excellent question, if I do say so myself.
Let's say that you are entering your annual expenses for
the first time. You know that you have big auto insurance
premiums, but you are not certain about their due months.
Furthermore, you don't feel like looking through your
records because you spouse just "organized" them and you no
longer can find a #!$*&%! thing!
Rather than succumb to frustration, you can enter the bill
with a 0 due month for now. Then, later, after you cool
down, you can research the mound of paper which your spouse
calls organization to find last year's bill.
I like searching through shoe boxes crammed with scraps of
paper. It's right up there with reading manuals on how to
use a financial calculator.
14
The Calculators SubMenu
At present, there are calculators only for Mortgage Loans
and Installment Loans. Upgrades to the PBT will feature
support for additional financial functions.
Neither the mortgage nor the installment loan calculators
require that you enter an amount for "Down Payment."
Before the calculator can show figures, however, you must
enter both the amount of the loan and the loan interest
rate.
As the screens point out, you may also change the loan
periods from the defaults.
Movement from field to field is accomplished through the
TAB key (the key to the left of the "Q") and the arrow
keys. If the cursor is not going to the field you wish to
get to, use the arrow key which points in the direction of
the field which you are trying to reach.
NOTE: On 8088 machines, PCs and XTs, the calculation speed
may be slow enough to delay cursor movement. If you
are using a PC or an XT (i.e., a machine slower than
an IBM AT), you can avoid confusion by pausing long
enough for the cursor to catch up with you.
Otherwise, if you keep on pressing the arrow keys,
the cursor will race past several fields after the
calculations are finished -- to catch up with you.
The pause which I am talking about is less than a
second. That is quite a long time, however, for us
computer users who are accustomed to instant
response.
=======================================================
"How much more will it cost me to finance my car over
four years instead of three?"
"How much will I save if I take the 10.5% loan from the bank
which I don't like instead of the 11% loan from the friendly
bank?"
"What effect will it have if I manage to scrape up another
$x toward the downpayment?"
"What will the extra $800 in options cost me each month?"
"What is the difference in the total cost of my mortgage if
I take a 15 instead of a 20 year mortgage? What is the monthly
difference in the payment? What is the total difference in the
cost?"
15
Calculators is a starter set of the Swiss Army knife
collection of tools which I shall be adding to the PBT.
(Even as a starter set, it answers the questions listed.)
Similar tools to PBT's calculators exist elsewhere -- in the
financial functions of a spreadsheet, in the special keys of
a financial calculator, in various $150 - $300 packages
which ask you to make a hobby of your finances. I don't
know you. Speaking for myself, however, I find that I don't
necessarily use my most powerful tools at all. For me, it's
a trade-off between the benefits and the bother. Financial
calculators frustrate the daylights out of me with their
arcane keystroke requirements. Spreadsheet documentation
doesn't talk to me in my language. I want to figure out
what my car payments will be. So, in vain, I look under
"payments." Nothing. No fool I, I then look under
"functions" and am told to look under "@functions".
I love to look through indices. Thanks.
So, I look under "@functions" and find the "@PMT" function which
tells me that it wants, as arguments, "prin," "int," and "term".
Great! So, now all I need to do is to find out the format in which
they want me to enter these numbers and I am, I hope, all set.
Thirty minutes later, I figure it all out and proudly behold my
finished product. It's all there. It works. I did it.
The PBT does not now and will not ever quiz you on your
grasp of such concepts as "future value," "present value"
and the like. Instead, it offers you options couched in
familiar language and brings you to a dedicated "calculator"
which does only one thing -- for only a totally dedicated
calculator can offer the ultimate in simplicity. So, even
though the formulas for mortgage loans and installment (i.e.
auto and major appliance) loans are the same, I provided two
separate screens for them. The former requests that you
specify the loan's duration in years (the rather common way
to ex-press mortgage loan durations) while the latter
requests that you specify the duration in months.
16
THE PBT ANALYSIS
The heart of the Personal Budget Tools (PBT) is its
analysis. It answers such questions as:
"What are my total monthly obligations -- both for this month
and for prudent cashflow management?"
"How much should I have in Short Term Savings to meet my
bills for this year?"
"Which bills come due next month?"
Although answers to these questions may seem obvious, I believe
you'll find some surprises about your finances as you fill in the
information needed about your annual, monthly, and weekly bills and
as you read through the analysis provided by the PBT. No longer
will your bills blindside you. With PBT's analysis, you'll see
what each month's requirements are and how to meet each of them
while remaining on an even keel.
The analysis provides you:
- an overall snapshot of your monthly requirement which consists
of:
- 1/12th of the total of your "annual" bills plus
- the total of your monthly bills plus
- the total of your weekly bills * 4.33
(Yes, some months have a bit more than 4.33 weeks and
some a bit less. This is an analysis to work with,
not a scientifically precise document. Most of us will
soon abandon a tool which too demanding.)
- a month-by-month breakdown of how to allocate your PHD
(Prudently Held Dollars) and your short-term savings. The
short term savings -- living either in a savings account or in
your checking account -- is money which makes it at least
temporarily to the bank. Your PHD, however, are dollars which
are often required in whole or in part to meet those annual
bills which come due during a given month.
17
Printing on Non-EPSON Compatible Printers
The PBT allows you to route the analysis to the screen,
to the printer, and to disk. The latter option, routing
the analysis to disk, is the one to choose if you find
that the PBT and your printer don't go well together.
The file which the PBT writes to disk, as
"filename.RPT," is in ASCII (i.e. text or non-document)
mode. As such, it can be imported into most word
processors. So, if your printer is not an EPSON
compatible printer, read "filename.RPT" into your word
processor and print it from there.
(PLEASE. Don't write me to ask how to do this with your
printer and your word processor. I probably don't
know. The place to look is in the documentation which
came with your word processor. If you have a word
processor which can't accept ASCII files (!!), then
consider getting a copy of Bob Wallace's PC-WRITE. It
correctly supports more printers than any of the Big
Advertisers. And, its handling of ASCII text is
exquisite.)
18
Appendix A - Types of Savings
The PBT is based on a concept which divides savings into
four categories:
1. PHD (Prudently Held Dollars) - The source of Short Term
Savings but not the same. Some PHD dollars, as the
analysis will point out, never make it to a savings
account.
2. Short Term Savings - Savings for expenses which will
occur within twelve months.
3. Intermediate Savings - Savings for planned major
purchases which will take place within 1 - five years.
Such savings will normally be reflected as a monthly or
weekly item.
4. Long Term Savings - College, retirement, self-insurance
against hard times. Like intermediate savings, such
savings will normally be recorded as monthly or weekly
items. Some may wish to make an annual entry if, say,
one's income tax refund check is to be salted away.
The PBT shows what to do for the first two types of savings,
the PHD and short term savings. By recognizing them for
what they are -- spent money -- you gain a clearer idea
about the status of your intermediate and long term savings.
TIP:
With the PBT, you can now combine all your savings
accounts into one account at your bank. Enter the amounts
you want for your Vacation and Christmas "clubs" on the
Annual Expense screen. Then, by following the advice of the
Analysis, you will be saving not only enough to pay your
other bills but also enough to cover your Vacation and
Christmas "clubs".
By combining your accounts, you may be able to avoid service
charges and to qualify for higher interest rates. Check it
out. Different banks have different requirements.
19
Appendix B - Navigation
The keyboard keys will work as you probably expect them to
work. Arrow keys move you in the expected direction. The
TAB key (i.e., the key to the left of the "Q") will bring
you to the next field, the SHIFTED-TAB key will bring you to
the prior field. The ESCape key will bring you to the Main
Menu. The PageUp and PageDown keys will page up and down if
there is more than one screen's worth of information or more
than one screen's worth of data entry room.
To help you find your way around, PBT features both drop-down menus
and comprehensive cross-referenced help.
Think of the horizontal menu bar as the Main Menu. To activate the
vertical drop-down menus, either press <ENTER> to activate the
highlighted option or press the highlighted letter of another menu
selection to activate that option. (Pressing the highlighted
letter is the equivalent of moving to a selection with the arrow
keys and then pressing the <ENTER> key for the selection.)
To return to the Main Menu from anywhere within the PBT, including
from a drop-down SubMenu), press <ESC>.
When the menus are not on the screen, you may activate Help with
the <F1> key. When the menus are showing, press <H> to drop-down
the Help sub-menu.
Once in Help, a second press of the <F1> key will bring up Help's
Topic index. Pressing <Alt-F1> from within Help brings you to the
last Help topic you viewed.
The cross-referenced items in a Help screen appear either in blue
uppercase (Highlighted for mono) or in reverse video. Those in
blue may be selected via the arrow keys. It is the selected item
which appears in reverse video.
To jump to a selected cross-referenced item, press <Enter>. To
return from a cross-referenced item back to the topic from which
you came, press <Alt-F1>.
20
APPENDIX C - Questions and Answers
1. How did you arrive at the minimum short term savings
figure?
I'm glad you asked that. (I've been watching a lot of
politicians on interview shows.)
Make a chart with a row (i.e. horizontal) for each
annual expense and a column (i.e. vertical) for each
month.
Then, take each of the annual expenses and figure out
its month-by-month accrual. For example, say you want
$360 for Christmas in December. In December, you
should have $30 for next year. In January, $60. In
February, $90; in March, $120; in April, $150; in
May, $180; in June, $210; in July, $240; in August,
$270; in September, $300; in October, $330; and, in
November, $360. Enter each figure for the Christmas
row under the column for its month.
The $720 bill due in February requires $720 in
January, $60 in February, $120 in March . . .
In December, it requires $660. (NOTE: The PBT
assures that the full amount of the expense is
available at the BEGINNING of the due month. So,
Christmas' funds are available in November and the
February bill's funds are available in January.)
Enter each figure for February's bill (Auto Ins?) in
the appropriate row under the column for its month.
Do the same for each annual expense (incl. quarterly
and semi-annual expenses).
Then, total the columns for each month from
January to December. The column total is NOT the
amount required in savings.
Find the month with the lowest amount. Subtract
that amount from each of the other months. Now you
have it, the minimum amount which must be in savings
each month to meet the annual obligations.
2. Why did you subtract out the lowest month?
The month with the lowest total reveals the Rob-
Peter-Pay-Paul amount. If your vacation is in June,
you are borrowing from your Christmas Club. Not to
worry, in December you will be borrowing from your
Vacation Club.
21
3. Is it safe to borrow from Peter to pay Paul?
It depends on how thorough a job you did in
identifying your annual bills. Don't forget, this
method has NO BUILT IN BUFFER for lack of thoroughness
on your part in identifying bills or for unanticipated
expenses.
How much do you need for a buffer? Take your best
guess and add that amount to the minimum savings
amounts shown in the month-by-month analysis.
Alternatively, add four entries to your Annual Expense
list called Surprise 1, Surprise 2, Surprise 3, and
Surprise 4. Space them 3 months apart. These are
funds for such things as the failure of the timing
chain, the water damage from your rusted out water
heater, and the despondent crow which hurls itself
through your picture window.
4. What formula did you use for the mortgage calculator?
int
payment = prin * ----------------
-n
1- (int+1)
where: prin = principal (present value)
int = periodic interest rate
n = term
5. What formula did you use for the installment loan
calculator?
See #4 above. The difference is that I accepted
the term in years for the mortgage calculator but
in months for the installment loan calculator.
6. Where is the documentation on your error messages?
There is none other than this since I tried to make
the messages self-explanatory.
INSUFFICIENT MEMORY FOR xxxxxxx - Means that your
machine does not have enough free memory. If you have
TSR (i.e., "pop-up") programs running, remove them and
try again. If you do not have TSR programs running,
you will have to increase memory to run the PBT.
If you are running the PBT from within a shell, try
running from the DOS prompt instead. The shell
program itself may be eating up the memory which the
PBT needs.
22
7. I don't get the HELP INDEX when I press F1 from within
Help. Nothing happens. What is wrong?
This is caused from insufficient memory. You can
still see the Help Index from the Main Menu by
pressing <H> for Help and then <I> for Index.
Again, remove any TSRs or shells if those are present.
Then rerun.
8. Who would benefit most from the PBT?
Because my first commercial system was a checking
system, and because lottsa young folk have gotten away
from balancing their checking accounts(!), a large
number of my customers are either retired or close to
retirement. They will probably be those who will most
appreciate what the PBT does because they will have
wrestled with the same problems which the PBT
addresses.
Nevertheless, I wish I could get the PBT into the
hands of young people just starting out on their own.
The analysis would be a wonderful gift for those who
never thought through the concepts of short-term vs.
longer-term savings. Even a college education doesn't
prepare its graduates with the knowledge of how to set
up budgets.
So, try to get your sons and your daughters to sit
down at your computer and to run an analysis. Point
out to them that the Help Screens will provide ideas
on the types of things to enter under each of the
categories -- annual, monthly, and weekly.
9. All my annual (or monthly or weekly) expense items
got blitzed. What gives?
The PBT wil accept up to 100 items in each category,
so it has a PageUp and a PageDown feature. The
chances are that you inadvertently paged down to the
next (and blank) screen of the expense entry. Hit the
PageUp key a few times and you will see your expenses
again. (I'll do something about this in the next
version.)
23
Version History
1.01 - Eliminated spill over of colors onto the Annual
Expense screen.
1.02 - Improved centering of the report title.
- Added "F10 toggle" option to the expense screens to
allow switching among the expense screens without
going up through the menus.
1.03 - Added printout of the weekly and monthly expenses
to the disk and printer versions of the analysis
report. Multiplied the weekly factor by 4.33 for
the first page of the analysis to correct the
statement of monthly obligations.
1.04 - Removed some of the more outrageous jokes from the
manual and fixed a one-cent rounding error which
sometimes showed up on the first page of the analysis.
24
About Shareware
Shareware is commercial software sold on the Honor
System. To some, that means that they'll play the system
and leave the Honor to the author. Such folks take pride
in being "Street Smart." They're using the wrong "S"
words to define themselves. The right ones are "Simply
Shabby".
To those of character, shareware means that one is
obligated to pay for software products which one
continues to use after an evaluation period. It's like
the newspapers left unattended. It's fair game to take a
look to see whether you want to buy it. It's simply
shabby to walk off with the paper without paying for it.
This is my second Shareware product. The first was CHECK KING.
CHECK KING did well as a shareware product. That makes it an
exception to the rule. Most Shareware, picked up through
distributors, user groups, and bulletin boards, sees very little
customer support. And, CHECK KING, too, saw very little business
except that generated through its national distribution as a
cover program -- and, later, Editor's Choice renewal incentive
program -- for Big Blue Disk. BBD claimed a 10,000 strong list of
subscribers and an additional 10,000 sales in book stores.
It takes a lot of time, A LOT OF TIME, to create programs as
polished and powerful as Check King and as the Personal Budget
Tools. You would not hesitate to pay the plumber or the
electrician large sums for spending a matter of hours at your
house. Why hesitate to pay the shareware author for spending
MONTHS on a program which saves you hours and which helps you to
organize?
The advantage of Shareware to me is that I can market my product
without the high expense and high risk of the normal marketing
path. The advantage to you is that I can sell the software for a
heckuva lot less than I could were I locked into packaging,
printing, and -- worst of all -- advertising.
The disadvantage of Shareware is that only a small subset of the
people who have it will pay me for it. Some don't pay because they
pride themselves on Street Smarts and would consider themselves
fools to pay for something which they can get for free. These
folks are morally bankrupt, so they have my blessing to console
themselves with money.
Others don't pay because they obtained the software for a few bucks
from a Shareware Distributor and figure that the distribution fee
which they paid the distributor was a purchase. It was not. The
author receives NOTHING from such purchases. The ethical
distributors point this out and try to encourage registrations in
25
their catalogs. (Money sent to distributors, usually from $2.50 to
$6.00, allows them to cover their expenses and to make a small
profit. That is alright. They are providing you a means of
testing out the software. They are providing me a means of
reaching potential customers. So, if everyone plays fair, we have
a WIN-WIN-WIN situation with WINs going to the consumer, to the
distributor, and to the author.)
26
APPENDIX F - REASONS TO REGISTER
1. It's the right thing to do.
2. It brings you to the latest version of the PBT along with a
surprise software bonus.
3. It brings you notice of my other software offerings.
4. It entitles you to support. In fairness to my family,
I cannot provide phone support. I shall, however, respond to
questions -- normally within two weeks. Send me your address
and, if you wish, your home phone number. Depending on the
nature of the question, I shall get back to you either in
writing or -- less frequently -- by phone.
5. You have nothing to lose. If you are dissatisfied with one of my
products within 30 days, simply write asking for a refund. Keep
the disk since I do not reuse disks returned to me. I'll somewhat
cheerfully send you the refund without question less $3 per
product returned to cover my disk, the mailer, the postage, the
label, and a pittance for my time. (Check King is one product.
The PBT is another. The DDS and TUTOR is the third.)
PBT registration, as of June 2, 1990, is $25. I reserve the
right to change the registration fee without notice -- since I have
no practical way to notify everyone. (But, I have no present plans
to increase the fee except for substantial unanticipated increases
in my costs.)
You don't have CHECK KING?! Ah well, that's easily remedied.
CHECK KING is just $20.
You're thinking about registering both? Let me provide an
incentive. Register both CHECK KING and the PBT at the same
time for a combined price of just $40.
Tom Rickenbacker
P.O. Box 11662
Newington, Conn. 06111
27
REGISTRATION FORM
Name: ____________________________________
Address: ____________________________________
____________________________________
ZIP: ______________ PHONE ( ) ___________
I heard about the PBT through ______________________________________
____________________________________________________________________
My computer is a _________________________________________________
with/without (circle one) a hard disk.
My printer is a _________________________________________________
Monitor: ___MonoChrome ___CGA ___EGA ___VGA
Memory: ___512K ____640K Other: (Please specify) _______
========================================================================
Circle one:
Personal Budget Tools $25.00
Check King alone $20.00
PBT & Check King $40.00
(Conn. residents, please add 8% sales tax to the total of
your order.)
I can provide the programs only on 5 1/4" disks.
Please send your remittance, in U.S. funds, to:
Rickenbacker Software
Box 11662
Newington, Conn. 06111