Setlist — Category-Based Budgets

A Setlist is how you control spending in Coincert. Each Setlist item tracks a spending limit for one or more categories over a repeating time period. As transactions come in, Coincert automatically tallies what you have spent and shows how much remains.

Create category-based budgets to track your spending. Use the Opener wizard to set up your first Setlist.

On iPad, the Setlist screen uses a split-view layout with sidebar navigation on the left and category-based budget tracking on the right.

Creating a Setlist Item

There are two ways to add an item to your Setlist:

From Scratch (Custom Item)

1. Open the Setlist tab.
2. Tap the + button in the top-right corner.
3. Choose Custom Item.
4. Fill in the form:
   • Item Name — A descriptive label (e.g., “Groceries” or “Fun Money”).
   • Spending Limit — The maximum amount you want to spend in a single period.
   • Period — Choose Weekly, Monthly, or Yearly.
5. Select one or more categories to track. Only expense categories are shown; income categories are excluded.
6. Configure your Cues (alert thresholds) and End of Period rollover behavior (see sections below).
7. Tap Save.

From a Setlist Opener (Template)

Setlist Openers are pre-built budget templates that divide your income across common spending categories automatically. They save you the work of creating each item individually.

1. Open the Setlist tab.
2. Tap the + button, then choose From Opener.
3. Select one of the available Openers:
   • 50/30/20 Rule — Allocates 50% to needs, 30% to wants, and 20% to savings. Creates individual Setlist items for Housing (25%), Utilities (5%), Groceries (10%), Transportation (10%), Entertainment (15%), and Shopping (15%).
   • Zero-Based — Every dollar gets a job (YNAB-style). Creates items for Housing, Utilities, Groceries, Transportation, Healthcare, Entertainment, Shopping, Personal Care, and Dining.
   • Essential Only — Focuses on necessities for tight budgets. Creates items for Housing, Utilities, Groceries, Transportation, and Healthcare.
   • Custom Starter — Starts blank so you can customize everything from scratch.
4. Enter your monthly income. The Opener uses this to calculate dollar amounts for each category based on its percentage allocation.
5. Choose a Setlist Period (Weekly, Monthly, or Yearly). The limits are scaled accordingly.
6. A Preview section shows the items that will be created and their calculated limits.
7. Tap Create to generate all items at once.

Each item created from an Opener gets its own default Cue configuration (80%, 90%, and 100% thresholds enabled).

Viewing Setlist Progress

The main Setlist screen shows a scrollable list of your active items. Each card displays:

• Gauge — A circular donut chart showing what percentage of the limit you have used. The gauge color changes based on usage:
  • Blue when under 80%.
  • Orange when between 80% and 100%.
  • Red when over 100%.
• Spent — The total spent so far in the current period. Turns red if you have exceeded the limit.
• Remaining — How much is left. Shown in green when positive, red when negative.
• Percentage — The center of the gauge shows the integer percentage spent. If you exceed 100%, the gauge displays “Over!” beneath the number.

Tap any card to open its detail view.

Setlist Detail View

The detail screen expands on the card with:

• A larger gauge at the top.
• A Summary section showing the Setlist Limit, Spent, and Remaining in your local currency.
• A Buy Now, Pay Later Commitments section (visible only when you have BNPL installments due within the current period). This shows how much of your remaining limit is spoken for by upcoming BNPL payments and calculates an Effective Available amount.
• A Categories section listing every category assigned to this item. Tap a category to drill into its transactions for the current period.

Cues (Alert Thresholds)

Cues are notifications that fire when your spending reaches a certain percentage of the Setlist limit. They help you course-correct before overspending.

Default Cues

When you create a new Setlist item, three threshold Cues are enabled by default:

A Pace-based Prediction Cue is also enabled by default. This Cue looks at your spending rate relative to how far through the period you are. If you are on track to exceed your limit before the period ends, it sends a warning even if you have not hit a percentage threshold yet.

Configuring Cues During Creation

When creating a Setlist item, the Cues section lets you toggle each default threshold and the pace-based prediction on or off before saving.

Custom Cue Thresholds

In the detail view of any Setlist item, the Cue Thresholds section lets you:

• View all current thresholds, listed with a bell icon and the percentage.
• Remove a threshold by tapping the X button next to it.
• Add a new threshold by tapping “Add Threshold” and entering a percentage between 5 and 200. For example, you could add a 50% checkpoint or a 150% overspend alert.

Custom thresholds are sorted automatically. Duplicates are prevented.

Advanced Cues

The Advanced Cues section contains the Pace-based Predictions toggle. When enabled, Coincert projects whether your current spending rate will exceed your limit before the period ends and sends an early warning if so.

Notification Permission

The first time you create a Setlist item, Coincert will prompt you to enable notifications. You can choose:

• Enable Cues — Grants notification permission so Cues can appear as push notifications.
• Not Now — Declines. Cue information will still be visible inside the app but will not generate push notifications. You can change this later in Settings.

End of Period (Rollover Behavior)

Each Setlist item has an End of Period setting that controls what happens to any unused spending limit when the period resets. The options are:

This setting is configured per Setlist item and can be changed at any time from the detail view.

Category Organization and Subcategory Rollup

Categories in Coincert support a one-level parent/child hierarchy. A parent category can have multiple subcategories (children), and a subcategory always belongs to a single parent.

How This Affects Setlists

When you assign a parent category to a Setlist item, spending from all of its subcategories is automatically included. Coincert uses the category’s “family IDs” — the parent plus all children — to match transactions.

For example, if you assign the “Food” category to a Setlist item and “Groceries” and “Dining Out” are subcategories of “Food”, then transactions in Groceries, Dining Out, and Food itself all count toward the Setlist limit.

You do not need to manually add subcategories. Adding the parent is sufficient to capture the full family of spending.

If you want finer control, you can assign individual subcategories instead of the parent. Only transactions matching those specific subcategories will count.

Subcategory Display

In the Categories section of a Setlist item’s detail view, tapping any listed category navigates to a filtered transaction list showing only that category’s transactions for the current period.

Editing a Setlist Item

From the detail view you can modify:

• Limit — Type a new spending limit. Changes take effect immediately and sync across devices.
• Period — Switch between Weekly, Monthly, or Yearly using the picker.
• Cue Thresholds — Add or remove thresholds as described above.
• Pace-based Predictions — Toggle on or off.
• End of Period — Change the rollover behavior.

All changes save automatically and sync to your other devices via iCloud.

Deleting a Setlist Item

1. Open the Setlist item’s detail view.
2. Scroll to the bottom and tap Delete Setlist Item.
3. The item is marked inactive and removed from your Setlist view.

Deleting a Setlist item does not delete any of your transactions or categories. It only removes the spending limit and its associated Cue configuration.

Platform Differences

iPhone / iPad

• The spending limit and custom threshold fields show a numeric keypad.
• Navigation uses a large title style with inline sub-screens.
• The End of Period picker renders with the inline picker style for easier browsing.
• The gauge remaining segment uses the system gray5 color.

Mac

• The spending limit and threshold fields use a standard text field (no numeric keypad).
• The detail view has a minimum size of 400 x 500 points to prevent cramped layouts.
• Pickers use the default macOS picker style (dropdown).
• The gauge remaining segment uses a gray with 20% opacity for a lighter appearance.