Tracking Expenses and Reimbursements

Managing Expenses

Divorce inevitably alters your financial situation. Effectively managing your expenses during and after the divorce, while controlling your new post-divorce budget, can increase your sense of security and help you make informed financial decisions.

With Alimentor, you can:

Collect and organize financial records for use during child custody disputes, ensuring all necessary documentation is readily available.
Plan your expenses and track the actual amounts spent.
Track payments between parents, including reimbursements and child support.
Record unexpected costs as they arise.
Generate expense reports and export your data to a spreadsheet for further analysis.
Share detailed information about parenting expenses with your ex-spouse and others, such as a divorce coach, lawyer, or family members.

There are two common approaches to selecting the scope of expenses tracked in Alimentor.

The first approach focuses on tracking expenses that contribute to calculating, understanding, and documenting the costs of raising your children, such as:

Housing, food, and clothing
Medical care (including insurance)
Child care
Educational fees
Extracurricular and social activities
Transportation
Holiday trips and vacations

The second approach involves tracking all significant expenses, even those not directly related to child-rearing, including:

Personal expenses
Debt payments
Home maintenance
Property, health, and life insurance

Learn more about collecting evidence for child custody cases ▶

Tracking Expenses in Alimentor Mobile App

Expense Records

Each Alimentor expense record can store the following information:

Payer and beneficiaries
Planned amount, date and time, location (if applicable)
Actual amount, date and time, location
Title and notes (expense description, hashtags)
Status: Planned, Actual or Canceled (unpaid)
Photos and scans
PDF attachments
Disagreement flag
Assigned custody factors
URL link

Payer and Beneficiaries

In Alimentor, each expense is assigned to a specific payer and beneficiary. This allows you to independently analyze and report expenses for each caregiver (you, the other parent, grandparents, etc.) and the child.

If an expense is assigned to more than one payee, its amount is split equally between the beneficiaries in the report. This is especially useful for expenses like family plan subscriptions.

Title

Using concise, generic expense titles like "Clothing", "Travel", or "Dental Treatment" offers several benefits in Alimentor:

Alimentor groups expenses by title, eliminating the need for complex category management.
The "Expense Summary" section in reports outputs expenses by title.
Searching for specific types of expenses in Diary and Planned is easier.

Detailed information about the expense can be included in the notes field.

If you need to further organize your expenses, you can use hashtags like #Trips, #ChildcareTaxCredit, or #MedicalDeductible. Simply enter these hashtags on a separate line in the notes field, and then use them as filter criteria when generating your reports.

Status

Status	Description	View
Planned	Scheduled (future) recurring and one-time expenses and payments.	Planned
Actual	Incurred expenses, including unplanned ones. For unplanned expenses, set the Scheduled switch/checkbox off (unchecked).	Diary
Canceled	Unpaid or overdue expenses. Use the Disagreement flag for problematic or missing liabilities.	Diary

Planned vs Actual

Each expense record can simultaneously store information about:

Planned amount and due date
Actual amount paid and payment date

This allows you to record partial or late payments and report any deviations.

Scans, Photos and Documents

Each Alimentor record can store multiple photos and PDF files, making it easier to compile comprehensive documentation for your child custody case.

To collect the best possible evidence, consider documenting your expenses by including:

Confirmations of money transfers and online purchases.
Invoices and receipts (in PDF format or as scans).
Photos of purchased goods or other relevant items.
Communication and correspondence with the other parent related to financial matters, such as iMessage and SMS conversations, and email correspondence.

Photos and attachments are included in the "Custody Journal", the last chapter of Alimentor's reports.

iOS Alimentor for iOS includes a built-in document scanner, which allows you to conveniently add scans of receipts directly to your records.

Reimbursements

Alimentor expense records can represent payments between parents. This functionality can be used to manage reimbursements.

Typical Workflow for Managing Reimbursements:

Create a New Expense Record:
- Enter all required details in the event editor, then select Add Reimbursement. This saves the expense record and opens a new view with the reimbursement details.
Edit the Reimbursement Record:
- Set the record status to Planned.
- Specify the due date.
- Enter the reimbursement amount.
Update the Record After Payment:
- Once the reimbursement is paid, update its status to Actual.
- Attach any necessary documents, such as a PDF with confirmation of the money transfer.

Reporting

Recorded expenses and payments are included in the following report sections:

Custody Summary: This section is organized by payer (parent) and beneficiary (child or parent). It displays total amounts spent and provides tables with planned and actual expenses (titles, amounts, dates/times, and notes).
Expense Summary: Summarizes total expenses for multiple caregivers and children. Reimbursements between caregivers are reported as a negative cost for the payee.
Custody Journal: Offers a detailed chronological list of all records, including expenses.

Sample Monthly Report

You can also export your data to a spreadsheet file (.xlsx) in order to perform custom calculations or to create charts.

If you have any questions about Alimentor, or want to share your feedback, please email us at: feedback@alimentor.org.