Fixed Costs (Needs)
The bills that arrive whether you like it or not, housing, utilities, basic groceries, getting to work, and the minimum on every debt.
Target £1,440
£0
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Give every pound a job.
Zero-based budgeting means income minus everything you've assigned equals nothing left over. Not because you spent it, but because you decided where it goes. Pick the ratio that matches the life you actually have, not the one a 2005 book assumed.
Monthly take-home pay
£
What actually lands in your account each month, after tax, pension and student loan. Not paid monthly? Take your weekly pay × 52 ÷ 12, so £550 a week is £2,383 a month. Paid every four weeks, it's × 13 ÷ 12.
Your ratioRealistic start
These are targets to aim at, not tests to pass. Start on the one you can hit this month, here's why that matters.
Flexible Costs (Wants)
The life part. Dining out, travel, subscriptions, hobbies. Not the enemy. This is the bucket that stops a budget being a punishment.
Target £480
£0
Future Costs (Savings)
Money for the version of you 12 months from now, emergency fund, pension, and anything paid above the minimum on a debt.
Target £480
£0
Left to assign
£0
- Fixed —
- Flexible —
- Future —
- Unassigned —
Save as PDF opens your browser's print dialog. Pick Save as PDF as the destination (on a Mac it's under the PDF dropdown). You get a one-page budget sheet you can keep, print or send on.
Everything you type stays in this browser (nothing is sent anywhere) and is still here when you come back. Educational budgeting tool, not regulated financial advice.
Read This First
Why 50/30/20 isn't a formula.
It's the most quoted budgeting rule in the world and, for a lot of people right now, the fastest way to feel like a failure in week one. Here's what it's actually for.
What the rule assumes Needs 50%
Where a lot of UK households actually sit Needs 65–75%
Same three buckets, same maths. Only the housing line moved, and everything the rule promises moves with it.
A rule written for a different housing market
50/30/20 comes from All Your Worth, a 2005 book by Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi. It was a genuinely good heuristic for its moment. But it assumed a world where keeping a roof over your head took roughly a third of your pay, and it was never written for someone renting in a UK city two decades later.
Housing is the number that moved
Rent or mortgage plus council tax and energy can now swallow half of take-home pay on its own, before a single food shop. Add transport and minimum debt payments and "needs" lands nearer 65–75% for a lot of households. The rule doesn't bend to that. It just returns fail, which tells you nothing you can act on.
A budget you fail immediately gets abandoned
This is the real damage. Someone whose needs are 68% opens a budgeting app, sees they've blown the rule on day one, decides budgeting isn't for people like them, and stops. A ratio you can actually hit is worth more than an ideal one you can't, because you'll still be using it in six months.
Pick your starting ratio, then move left
Start on the ratio that reflects this month honestly: 70/15/15 if things are tight, 60/20/20 for most people. Then treat the others as a direction of travel: as debts clear, income rises or housing costs settle, you shift toward 60/20/20, then 50/30/20. Progress is moving one point at a time, not landing on a number from a 2005 paperback.
What actually matters more than the ratio
Every pound is assigned. That's the zero-based part, and it's the bit that changes behaviour. Unassigned money doesn't survive the month. It leaks. Getting to £0 left is the win, whatever the split looks like.
Future Costs is above zero. Even £25 a month. A tiny emergency fund is what stops the next car repair becoming next year's credit card balance, which is the single most common way a good credit file gets damaged.
Minimums live in Fixed, extra payments live in Future. Keep them apart. The minimum is a bill; anything above it is you buying your way out of debt faster, and it belongs with your savings so you can see it.
You revisit it. A budget is a forecast, and forecasts are wrong. Come back at the end of the month, adjust what was unrealistic, and run it again.
Next Step
Budget balanced, but the credit file still holding you back?
A 1:1 session is an hour on your actual report, what's hurting your score, in what order to fix it, and what it takes to get approved for the thing you're actually after.
Book a 1:1 Session