Click Here To Get Rich

Where does your money go? We look at spending trackers and finance apps to figure out if the bots can actually help with your budgeting

- Nasrin Modak Siddiqi

Ideally, using a fintech app should make you feel like you're in a TV commercial. A good app will track your salary, every swipe of your card, and all your digital spending, even work out a financial planning advisory. So when your parents rant about your spending spiralling out of control, you flash your app in their faces, showing that, financially, all is well.

Do fintech apps do what they claim to? What's happening to your data when an app knows about your salary, wealth, debt, splurges and secret spending? Maybe the clueless one in the commercial is you? Here's what users say.

Portion control Splitwise, which splits expenses shared with friends, roommates, etc, is the Facebook of the fintech space. Everyone uses it even if they don't like it. Clinical dietitian and nutritionist Aditi Prabhu (34) uses it to set her monthly budget and track spending when she's out with friends. So do Bengaluru-based tech colleagues Amal Raut (23) and Ajit Kumar (22). "It's like a chopdi [notebook] which saves you the stress of remembering who owes who how much," says Raut. Kumar thinks it's great for a night out or a trip with the gang, but not for tracking personal expenses or setting reminders for EMIS.

Prabhu has mixed opinions about its usefulness. "The expenses can be split in different ways and multiple people can be added, but the totalling system can get confusing," she says.