Inspiration
The purpose of the program is inspired by our own struggle with budgeting when settling into university. As a team we all agreed that we could make use of a budgeting system, leading to the goal we set.
What it does
Budgie can connect to most reputable bank accounts, collecting data from statements to analyse users' spending habits. It displays the most frequent spending categories in a concise manner, whilst offering a more detailed overview of transactions. Budgie has a separate section to view repeat transactions, helping the user spot unnecessary payments such as unused subscriptions - which can easily be forgotten about.
The visual component of Budgie shows a graph of expenses/revenue over time, as well a graph of how the user's bank balance varies. Using predictive functionality it shows a projection into the future of what balance and expenses may look like, aiding the user in planning to save money ahead of time.
How we built it
We created this web app using Flask, requiring use of HTML, CSS, Javascript and Python to complete. To fetch data directly from bank accounts, we used a service called Plaid - they allow us to access most UK accounts using Open Banking.
Challenges we ran into
None of us had any significant experience with front end web development, so we had to learn Flask and the other technologies surrounding it during the hackathon. The first API we attempted to use for bank data (Tink) did not work so we had to start over after spending time learning to implement that.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
We're proud of ourselves for creating a usable front-end UI, and for learning to use Flask in such a short amount of time.
What we learned
Front end and Flask mainly. More generally, lessons were learnt about time management and version control.
What's next for 3C1M
We would love to help the user directly by offering recommendations for daily/weekly spending limits, calculated based on a user-set savings goal.
Log in or sign up for Devpost to join the conversation.