A Note On BudgetForLife's Privacy & Security
As soon as you click the 'Get My Budget' button, BudgetForLife becomes completely, 100% yours. What's happening technically upon clicking this button is that you're making a copy of our BudgetForLife template and adding it to your own Google Drive. Thus, the information within users' BudgetForLife spreadsheets is as private and secure as Google itself! Let's contrast that with what the other guys are doing, like Mint, YNAB, Every Dollar, Personal Capital, banks, and the rest of them:
IdentityOther budget apps may require you to provide an array of personal information, perhaps even selling your data to marketers. BudgetForLife collects minimal information (typically only your name and email address) for the sole purpose of maintaining your BFL subscription.
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PlatformOther budget softwares require users to join their platform. BudgetForLife uses Google Drive, a platform that users already use, know, and trust. Not to mention, a platform that is far less susceptible to data breach.
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OwnershipOther budget softwares keep ownership to themselves. At BudgetForLife, we're not just letting people use our software, we're actually giving them our software! Total and autonomous ownership belongs to the user.
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PrivacyOther budget softwares know every dollar their users make and spend. Hence claims like, "new users save $ amount in the first year!" - they see everything. On the other hand, no one sees your BudgetForLife but you. Turns out the supposed perk of syncing with your cards can come at a cost!
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CostOther softwares constantly upsell users, and often charge fees so high that they price out those who could most benefit from budgeting. BudgetForLife users, however, get full-access (not a 'base version') from day one. The first 6 months are free, and it costs $10 per year thereafter, with no targeted upsells or upgrades.
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QualityOther budget softwares, categorically speaking, have fewer features, and are less customizable. Not only that, but several years can go by between meaningful updates! BudgetForLife does more, is more personalized to each user, and is constantly improving.
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This is why we built BudgetForLife!
The Key Difference Between 'Us' and 'Them'
Why can BudgetForLife make so many claims that the major players in the industry can't? Simply put, it's because at the end of the day, the major players were intentionally built by profit-seeking enterprises and employees. They exist primarily to make money, and thus are limited to improving by only as much as makes 'business-sense' - i.e., as much as users will pay for.
BudgetForLife is a totally different story. We built BFL on accident and out of passion. We actually just really, really enjoy this stuff! Recognizing its utility, we'd been giving it away for years with genuinely no catch - something you'll never be able to say about our competitors. Now, 10 years in and over ten thousand hours invested, not much has changed! We continue to iterate and improve, not because the money is suddenly flowing, but because let's face it: we can't help ourselves :)
Perhaps it shouldn't come as a surprise, then, that purpose-driven people can do more and do better than people chasing after the next dollar.
BudgetForLife is a totally different story. We built BFL on accident and out of passion. We actually just really, really enjoy this stuff! Recognizing its utility, we'd been giving it away for years with genuinely no catch - something you'll never be able to say about our competitors. Now, 10 years in and over ten thousand hours invested, not much has changed! We continue to iterate and improve, not because the money is suddenly flowing, but because let's face it: we can't help ourselves :)
Perhaps it shouldn't come as a surprise, then, that purpose-driven people can do more and do better than people chasing after the next dollar.
Reviewing BudgetForLife Permissions
All of that said, whenever an app asks for any sort of permissions, it can freak us out a little bit. Thus, in the spirit of transparency, allow us to explain what new users can expect when getting started with BudgetForLife. If you still have any unanswered questions, please don't hesitate to reach out!
After users generate their own copy of BudgetForLife, they open it and find themselves at this welcome page. As new users, naturally they'll click the 'Get Started' button, and it's at that point where they'll come across the big, scary, permissions message:
What does this mean? Well, first of all, it means that Google has already inspected the safety and legitimacy of BudgetForLife and given it its stamp of approval. That's a big deal! If Google didn't trust BudgetForLife, users would be seeing this message instead. Still, even though Google's already checked us out, they ask users to authorize because they want to make sure people know what they're doing. That's good news, because we want that, too :)
In our case, users are simply giving BudgetForLife permission to run. BudgetForLife operates on thousands of lines of code we've written in Google Apps Script that basically give the spreadsheet superpowers. But remember what we mentioned earlier? Users own the spreadsheet, not us! We're giving away the BudgetForLife software itself; therefore, users own the whole thing.
Now who or what are users granting access to? - "BudgetForLife Buttons" - not us as the creators, not getmybudget.com, but BudgetForLife Buttons. And who owns BudgetForLife Menus? The user does! It's all internal. What's happening is the user's spreadsheet is requesting the user's permission for the spreadsheet itself to function. Essentially, it's Google saying, "Do you know this is a super spreadsheet with lots of extra features that other spreadsheets don't have? Are you sure you want this spreadsheet to use its super powers?" Of course! The way they ask it is so cautious that it can make us feel like everything is about to go wrong, but the reality is there's not a more secure or more private budget software on planet Earth. Not even close.
In Summary
* No one and nothing else can see or access your BudgetForLife spreadsheet but you - not even us, the creators.
* Your BudgetForLife spreadsheet can only operate within itself - it cannot see or manage anything else in your Google Drive, Gmail, etc.
* Your BudgetForLife spreadsheet does not share any of your information or data with us or with anything in any way, shape, or form
* Your data is more secure with BFL than other budgeting software out there.
* Your BudgetForLife spreadsheet can only operate within itself - it cannot see or manage anything else in your Google Drive, Gmail, etc.
* Your BudgetForLife spreadsheet does not share any of your information or data with us or with anything in any way, shape, or form
* Your data is more secure with BFL than other budgeting software out there.