Help & how-tos

Getting Started

A two-minute tour of Tallé — what the main screens do and where to begin.

1. Open Tallé. There's no account to create and nothing to sign in to — the app is ready to use straight away.
2. Add your income first. Budgets are built from what you actually earn, so start there.
3. Set up a budget or two. Give your regular spending categories a monthly limit.
4. Record entries as you go: tap Add today on the home screen. Tallé tracks each one against the right budget automatically.

In the app, Help shows a Getting Started checklist above the topic search. Once you've completed it, the checklist disappears from Help. To bring it back, go to Settings › Preferences › Reset getting started.

Add Income

Record what's coming in, so your budgets have something to work from.

1. Tap the $ icon at the top to open Budget & Income, then tap Income.
2. Tap Select source and choose its type — Full-time, Part-time, Self-employed, Tips, Pension, Investments, Rental, Benefits, Student funding, Support payments or Other. Each type shows a short hint, such as "Includes gig and side work" for Self-employed.
3. Enter the amount it brings in that month. To add more, tap + Add another source; you can have up to 8.
4. Tap Save Changes. The button changes to Saved, and your income shows on Budget & Income.

Add a Budget

Set a spending limit for a category and watch it through the month.

1. Tap the $ icon at the top to open Budget & Income, then tap Budget.
2. Tap a category — groceries, fuel, anything you want to keep an eye on. Categories without a budget say Not set.
3. Enter the amount you want to spend in that category each month, and tap Save.
4. Tap Save Changes. Tallé says "Budgets saved successfully!"; tap OK. The budget bar on your home screen fills as you record entries against it.

Copy Last Month's Budget or Income

Start a new month with last month's numbers instead of typing them in again.

1. Open the Budget or Income screen on an empty month, or move to one with the month arrows at the top.
2. If the month before has entries, Tallé asks "Copy Previous Budget?" or "Copy Previous Income?"
3. Tap Yes. They're copied and saved straight away, and you can change any amount afterwards.

Budgets copy each category's amount. Income copies each source's type and amount.

Tallé only asks about a month with nothing in it yet, and not once you've started typing in it. If you tap No, it asks again the next time you open that screen. There's no separate copy button.

Add an Entry

The thing you'll do most — logging what you just spent.

1. Tap Add today on the home screen and choose the category the purchase belongs to.
2. Type the amount.
3. Add a note if you want to remember what it was for — this is optional.
4. Tap Save entry. The entry is counted against that category's budget right away.

Once a category has a budget or entries this month, it also appears on your home screen. Tap it to open its entries, then tap + Add a … entry (for example, + Add a Groceries entry) to add another.

Edit an Entry

Fix an amount, a detail, a note or the date after the fact.

1. Tap its category on the home screen to see this month's entries.
2. Tap the entry to open it.
3. Change whatever needs changing — amount, details or note.
4. To move it to another day, tap Change date under the amount. On Android, pick the day in the calendar. On iPhone, pick it on the date card and tap Use this date.
5. Tap Update entry. Budget totals update to match.

Delete an Entry

Remove something you logged twice or entered by mistake.

1. Tap its category on the home screen to see this month's entries.
2. Tap the bin icon beside the entry you want to remove.
3. Tap Delete when Tallé asks "Delete entry?" The entry is removed from your device and its category total is adjusted. This can't be undone.

Export Data

Your records are yours — take a copy out of the app whenever you like.

1. Open Settings from the ⋮ menu at the top and tap Export data.
2. Pick a format: .csv, .json or .xlsx (an Excel workbook). You can also tick "Include QuickBooks import file".
3. Choose the date range: This month, Last 3 mo, YTD or All time.
4. Save it or share it. Every export is a single ZIP file, created on your device and named for the months it covers, for example talle-export-2026-10-csv.zip for October 2026. On Android, Save ZIP to device puts it in your Downloads folder. On iPhone and iPad, Save to Files lets you choose where to keep it, such as iCloud Drive or On My iPhone. Share to app sends it to another app, such as Drive or email.

Backing up and restoring

1. On the Export screen, under Backup & Restore, tap Create a backup.
2. Add a password if you want one — it's optional. With a password, the backup is encrypted with AES-256. If you forget the password, that backup can't be restored.
3. Tap Create backup. Tallé makes talle-backup-YYYY-MM-DD.zip. On Android it's saved to your Downloads folder, and a second backup on the same day is named talle-backup-YYYY-MM-DD (2).zip. On iPhone and iPad, Save to Files opens so you can choose where to keep it.
4. Tap Share on the next screen if you also want to send it by email or to another app, somewhere you can reach from your new phone.
5. To restore, tap Restore from a backup and choose that .zip file. Tallé checks the file first, and nothing is replaced unless it passes. Restoring replaces all the data on that phone with the backup. It needs the free trial or the full version; you can save a backup any time, even after your trial ends.

A backup brings your data, not your trial status. The phone you restore to keeps its own trial or full version.

If your data is ever too large for a backup file (that's tens of thousands of entries), Tallé tells you before saving anything. You can still export it as CSV or Excel.

If Tallé can't open your data when it starts, you can restore a backup straight from that screen. If you'd bought Tallé, the full version comes back automatically or with Restore purchase.

Your phone's own backups don't include Tallé's data. On iPhone and iPad it's left out of iCloud and Finder backups, and on Android it's left out of Google backup and device-to-device transfer. To move to a new phone, use a Tallé backup.

Importing into QuickBooks

1. On the Export screen, tick "Include QuickBooks import file". QuickBooks.csv is added to your ZIP.
2. Unzip the file on your computer.
3. In QuickBooks, upload QuickBooks.csv to the bank or credit card account you want.
4. Match the Date, Description, Credit and Debit columns.
5. If QuickBooks asks for a date format, choose DD/MM/YYYY. Tallé writes 1 October 2026 as 01/10/2026.

Expenses are in the Credit column and income is in the Debit column. Your other export files use YYYY-MM-DD dates, which spreadsheets read correctly everywhere. In CSV files and QuickBooks.csv, text that starts like a formula (with =, +, - or @) is kept as text, so a spreadsheet won't run it.

Set Preferences

Currency, appearance, and the other small settings that make Tallé yours.

1. Open Settings from the ⋮ menu at the top.
2. Set your Currency and Unit system so amounts and fuel details display the way you expect.
3. Turn Dark mode on or off to suit how you use the app.
4. Changes are saved straight away. There's no save button.

Tallé uses one currency for your whole ledger. If you have any entries, income or budgets, Tallé asks before changing it. The new currency is shown on all your entries, budgets and income, and amounts aren't converted.

To hide categories you don't use, see Categories.

Categories and hiding the ones you don't use

Every entry and budget belongs to a category, so you can see at a glance where your money goes. Tallé has 20 built-in categories, and you can hide any you don't use.

Fuel

Gas, diesel, propane and EV charging for your vehicles.

Groceries

Food and household items from grocery stores.

Housing

Rent or mortgage and the costs of keeping up your home.

Insurance

Premiums that protect you, your home, your vehicles and your pets.

Vehicle

Owning and running a vehicle, plus transit and rideshares. Fuel has its own category.

Entertainment

Fun and leisure: outings, events, hobbies and subscriptions.

Meals

Eating out: restaurants, takeout, coffee and delivery.

Cell Phone

Mobile plans, devices and accessories.

Internet

Home internet service and equipment.

Bills

Utilities and other regular household bills.

Services

Help you pay for around the home and professional services.

Medical

Health costs: prescriptions, appointments, dental, vision and more.

Pets

Food, vet visits, grooming and supplies for your pets.

Childcare & Kids

Daycare, babysitting, camps, activities and school costs.

Clothing & Personal Care

Clothes, shoes, haircuts and toiletries.

Gifts & Giving

Gifts for others, celebrations and charitable donations.

Travel

Trips away from home: flights, lodging, transport and activities.

Debt Payments

Loan and credit payments. For credit cards, record interest or balance payments only when you haven't logged the purchases themselves, to avoid counting them twice.

Investments

Money set aside in savings and investment accounts, and related fees.

Other

Anything that doesn't fit elsewhere. Add a note so you can recategorize it later.

To hide a category:

1. Open Settings and go to Preferences › Categories.
2. Switch off any category you don't use.
3. Confirm if asked. If the category has a budget or entries this month, Tallé asks you to confirm. It will still appear in any month that has them.

• Other is always shown.
• Hiding never deletes anything or changes your totals. Hidden categories are still included in totals, Analysis, exports and backups.
• Turn a category back on any time from the same screen.
• The setting is kept in your backups, so it comes with you when you restore.

Add Details to an Entry

Some categories let you record more than an amount, so your entries say what you actually bought.

1. Start a new entry and choose its category.
2. Add the details that category offers — for example, the store for Groceries, or fuel type, volume and odometer for Fuel. They're all optional.
3. Save. The details stay with the entry, on your device.

Trends

Trends shows how your money moves over time.

Open Analysis, then tap Trends. Pick a period at the top (for example, the last 6 months), then choose:

• Income vs Spend: your income and spending month by month.
• Categories: every category ranked by spending, with a small trend line for each. Tap one to see its monthly bars, its budget for each month and its average.
• Net: what you kept (or overspent) each month, with your best and worst months. Months where you haven't entered income are marked, so they don't look like a loss.

Savings Projection

Project what regular saving could grow into over time.

1. Open Analysis and scroll to Savings Projection.
2. Enter the Amount you save and choose how often: Weekly, Bi-weekly or Monthly, whichever matches your pay cycle.
3. The slider sets the Annual return; 7% is a common long-term average for broadly diversified investments, but adjust it to whatever matches your situation.
4. The chart shows two lines: what you put in, and what the total could become with compounding. The gap between them is the compounding effect over time.

This is a motivation tool, not a plan. Real returns vary year to year — some years will be higher, some lower, some negative. Use the summary numbers as a rough guide, not a target.

App Lock

Ask for your phone's own screen lock — fingerprint, face or PIN — before anyone can open Tallé.

1. App lock needs a screen lock on your phone (a PIN, pattern, password, fingerprint or face). Without one, App lock stays off and Tallé asks you to set one up first.
2. Turn it on under Settings → Privacy → App lock. Tallé asks you to unlock once first, so you can't turn on a lock you can't open.
3. Unlock the way you unlock your phone. Tallé uses whatever your phone uses: fingerprint or face if you've set them up, otherwise your PIN, pattern or password. With only a PIN set, the PIN is asked for straight away.
4. When you come back to Tallé, it shows "Tallé is locked" and asks you to unlock: when you open the app fresh, or after being away for more than about 30 seconds. Tapping a notification and coming right back doesn't ask again.
5. If Tallé can't open your phone's lock, it stays locked; tap Unlock to try again.

If you remove your phone's screen lock later, App lock turns itself off and tells you, so you're never locked out. Restoring a backup doesn't change App lock on this phone.

To turn App lock off, switch it off in the same place. Tallé doesn't ask you to unlock for that, since you're already in. From then on it opens straight away, and it's no longer hidden in the app switcher.

While App lock is on, Tallé is hidden in the app switcher and recent apps. On Android 12 and older, screenshots and screen recording of Tallé are also blocked.

App lock is a convenience barrier, not device-wide encryption. Someone who knows your device password could still get to your data through your device's file system — this is true of every app on your phone. If you want stronger protection on a backup file you share or store elsewhere, use the backup-password option when creating the backup.