Who wins: you, your rules, or the bank

A transaction can collect categories from several places. Pennyweight keeps all of them and shows the one with the highest rank, so a rule never undoes a choice you made. If categories are new to you, start with how categories work.

The order

From strongest to weakest:

1. You. A category you set. This includes any category your AI sets when it edits a transaction for you.
2. A rule. The category a rule gave the transaction, either as the transaction came in or when your rules were applied.
3. An imported category. The category a row carried in a file you imported.
4. Your bank. The category code that came with a linked bank transaction.

Within the same rank, the most recent category wins. If you change a category twice, your latest choice shows. See find out why a transaction has its category.

What this means for rules

• A rule never overrides you. When rules run, they skip every transaction whose category you set yourself. Once you have set a transaction's category, rules leave it alone from then on.
• A rule does replace imported and bank categories. When a rule would replace a bank category on a transaction updated in the last 90 days, the preview flags that row.
• Your later edits beat a rule. A category a rule set is recorded as the rule's, so when you change it yourself, your choice shows.
• The same order holds as transactions come in. Your rules categorize imports, transactions your AI adds without a category, and new bank transactions as they're added. A rule replaces the file's or the bank's category, but a category you give a transaction by hand stays. Transactions already in your ledger change only when your AI applies your rules to them. See apply your rules to transactions you already have.
• Pins stop rules too. If you pinned a decision about a merchant in your AI's memory, rules skip that merchant's transactions in that ledger. See what your AI remembers.

When two rules match

If two active rules match the same transaction, the rule created first wins. The preview before applying lists the rows where rules disagree, with the winning rule and the others. When you create a rule with the same merchant pattern as an existing rule but a different category, your AI gets a warning.

Rules have no priority setting. To let a newer rule win, ask your AI to turn off or delete the older one. See when two rules match the same merchant.

How to see it

1. Ask your AI to set a category on one transaction.
2. Ask it to create a rule for the same merchant with a different category, and to apply it.
3. Ask which category that transaction ended up with. The one you set stays.
4. To check a rule, ask your AI to show it. You'll see what it matches, its category, its ledger and whether it's active. Create a rule covers writing one.

What you'll see

For the first prompt, your AI saves Office on last month's FiberNet Home charge, then creates the rule and applies it. It may show a preview and ask you to confirm first; see preview and confirm. The other FiberNet Home charges move to Internet. Last month's charge keeps Office, because a category you set outranks a rule.

For the second, your AI creates both rules and shows a preview without saving anything. The Daily Grind Coffee purchases would get Coffee, from the first rule, and the preview flags that the second rule disagrees.

Good to know

• To change a category you set yourself, ask your AI to change it directly. Changing a recent decision asks you to confirm first. See why your AI asks before changing a category.
• Rules belong to one ledger and only touch that ledger's transactions.
• When a pending bank transaction posts, your category and any rule's category carry over. Only the bank's own code is refreshed.
• If a rule skipped a transaction you expected it to catch, see a rule didn't categorize a transaction.
• Not sure whether you need a rule at all? See rules or a one-time cleanup.