Track your first expenses¶

In this tutorial you'll open the tracker, set up your students, decide a few form lines, log an expense with only partial information, complete it later, and export a backup. It takes about ten minutes and needs nothing but a browser.

1. Open the page¶

Open the tracker's address. The header says Saved in this browser: everything you do is kept in this browser, for this address.

2. Tell it about your students¶

Go to Rules & settings. Under Students, click Add student for each child and give them a name, a birth year and their scholarship program (FES-UA, FES-EO, FTC or PEP), then Save students. A new tracker has no students until you add them.

The program decides which form lines are offered to that student; the birth year drives soft age notices (for example, VPK lines for a twelve-year-old).

3. Decide a few lines¶

Open Category tree. Each category expands into types and details, exactly as on the reimbursement form. On any row:

• Pick a status: Routine (you submit this regularly), Used (you use it), To check (ask SUFS or look it up), Not for us.
• Click a student's chip to say the line applies to them. A struck-through chip means that student's program doesn't offer the line.
• Note keeps free text on the line: vendors you use, what to ask SUFS, why you ruled it out.

A status on a category or type is inherited by everything under it, so you can mark a whole category Not for us in one click and refine the exceptions.

Lines with an Ideas button list common providers and purchases for that line, with rough prices, to help you think of what you already pay for. They're suggestions to look through, not a list of what SUFS approves. The search box finds them too: type a provider or an item (Netflix, hot glue) and the tree shows the lines it belongs under.

Try it: find Instructional Material › Educational Software/Subscriptions › Video/TV/Online Streaming Services and mark it Used.

4. Answer the prompt with what you know¶

Marking a line Used opens a short dialog: who provides it, when, how much, what it was, any note. You don't have to know everything yet. Many lines come with Ideas, a row of common providers with ballpark prices; click Netflix there (or type it as the provider), leave the rest blank, then Add to log.

Switch to Overview. Under Needs details you'll see the Netflix entry flagged Needs date, amount. The tracker keeps partial information and reminds you to complete it, rather than refusing it.

5. Complete the entry¶

Click Complete next to it. The expense form opens on the Submissions tab with the entry loaded. Fill in the purchase date and the amount, then Save changes. It disappears from Needs details and shows up under Still to submit for its school year.

6. Log a purchase directly¶

On Submissions, use the form at the top: date, vendor, the receipt's Invoice/Receipt # (the SUFS form asks for it; an online order number counts), status, what it was, then the item: its form line (start typing a word from the line's name, or a provider such as KiwiCo, and pick it from the list; clicking the field or pressing ↓ shows the list without typing), quantity, price each before tax, and Tax, shipping, etc.: whatever the receipt adds on top, as one amount, the way the SUFS form asks for it. Pick the student, add a note, Add to log.

One receipt can cover several form lines (a monitor and a desk lamp from the same order): + Add an item gives each its own line, price, and tax, shipping, etc., and the expense total adds them up. Remove takes an item away again; an expense always keeps at least one. More details on an item holds what the SUFS form may ask for: a different vendor or Invoice/Receipt # for that item (for one file holding several receipts), "How will this item/service help your student learn?", and the item's web address.

Each item's form line links the expense to the tree; a line that had no status yet is set to Used for you.

The expense's Status is where its SUFS request stands: To submit, Draft, Submitted, In review, Changes requested, Completed. Once it is under way, each item gets a Result (Approved, Paid or Denied), since SUFS decides item by item; the log shows the results next to the status. Click a row in the log to see the expense's items, files and note without opening the form.

7. Export a backup¶

Back on Rules & settings, click Export .json. The file holds every decision, log entry and student. Keep it somewhere safe; the header will remind you when there are changes you haven't exported.

That's the whole loop. Next: Repeat and duplicate expenses for monthly subscriptions, and Back up and move your data before you switch browsers or devices.