Should i use mint or not

We may earn a commission from offers on this page. Terms may apply to offers listed on this page. Bottom line: If you want a completely free budgeting app that allows you to organize all of your finances in one place, Mint is a good choice. It's particularly a great pick for beginning savers and budgeters. Mint is a free personal finance app that makes it easy to manage and save money. Developed by Intuit, Inc, this mobile app is a budgeting tool that lets users manage and track their spending.

You can also set category-specific budgets and savings goals. The Mint budgeting app connects with your financial accounts, so users can get a clear picture of their financial health and total debt within the app. It's useful because it can teach you to save money more effectively while also helping to improve your financial literacy. You'll need to download the app and sign up for an account to use its features.

You can then set a total monthly budget, categorize expenses, track your spending by category, and monitor your credit score. With Mint, you can set up bill reminders and get alerts when you overspend beyond your set budget, get charged a late fee, or when an upcoming bill is almost due.

This budget app also includes goal-setting tools so you can set financial goals and track your progress. You won't need to invest in a premium membership to access all the features Mint offers. This isn't the case with other budgeting apps on the market. Students and others just getting started saving and budgeting, or trying to spend less while improving your budgeting skills, will find that this app is a good fit. You should feel comfortable using Mint. Intuit uses VeriSign to securely transfer your data and multi-factor authentication to protect your account.

With Mint, it's easier to monitor your credit. Users are able to view their credit score at any time and track changes. And your score won't be negatively impacted by this feature because Mint performs a soft credit check.

Mint supports a variety of financial accounts, allowing you to have a clear picture of your total debt without having to use other budgeting apps. With this app, you'll be able to see all of your accounts in one place, including:. Mint is one of the best budgeting apps to use if you have a financial goal and want to monitor your spending regularly. It shows your account balance and recent transactions.

It also lets you know about upcoming bills. With the Mint app, you can easily set up account alerts so you don't miss payments or overspend. If you think you might have overlooked something, you can do a quick search for the tag name, which should highlight those transactions that haven't been tagged yet.

Using a tag for verification purposes makes record keeping easier but it's also a good idea if you're concerned about one of your accounts getting hacked. If you do a tag search and a charge shows up that you don't recognize, it could tip you off to possible identity theft before the crooks have had a chance to funnel any more money out of your account. Mint was created with your financial prosperity in mind. As such, it doesn't take your security lightly.

Mint comes with a number of security features that it touts as being on par with what your bank already offers. Once you've synced up your accounts using your bank's login information, you can create a unique PIN to sign into your Mint account.

Additionally, the information you use to sign in to Mint is stored in a separate database with its own hardware and software encryption. If something happens and your phone is lost or stolen, you can delete your account from another computer or mobile device remotely.

Mint also monitors user accounts remotely for unusual spending activity -- that means, if something pops up that you didn't authorize, you'll receive an alert immediately. The sooner you know about things like this, the faster you can take care of them and get your accounts back in good standing.

The reason people like Mint is because it allows you to see all of your financial details in one place. When you create an account, you're able to link all of your bank accounts, credit cards, and investment accounts. The catch is that you have to provide the username and password you use for each one, which can certainly make you feel jittery if you're worried about a security breach.

Mint is designed to be a read-only service, which means you can't transfer money back and forth between accounts. If someone were to get their hands on your Mint login, all they'd be able to do is view your balances and transactions.

Your full account numbers aren't displayed, nor are your bank account or credit card usernames and passwords; the only thing that would be visible would be your email address. If a hacker was interested in taking things a step further, there's always the possibility that they could physically steal the information from Mint's secure servers - but that's really a long shot.

That would require knowing where the servers are located, bypassing the physical security measures that are in place, and cracking the code on how the data is encrypted.

If that were to happen, then your personal information might be at risk, but so far, there's no record of it being attempted. Even though Mint's security seems to be pretty airtight, there are still a few things you can do to make sure you're keeping your account information as safe as possible.

That way, you don't have to worry about your regular email getting hit with phishing scams if someone succeeds in getting a peek at Mint's information. Whether or not you're using a personal finance app like Mint, you should always be changing your bank and credit card passwords on a regular basis.

To further strengthen your passwords, you can try setting passwords that are long and contain a mixture of numbers and characters.

Just be sure you're updating your information on Mint when you make these updates to ensure that your accounts are syncing properly. Finally, you should avoid using Mint over Wi-Fi services and you should also be mindful about allowing third-party access to your account through Facebook or other apps. One thing you need to keep in mind when using Mint is how it affects your fraud protection with your bank.

If your account terms and conditions prevent you from sharing your username or password with a third-party site, you may end up being held responsible if someone is successful in compromising your Mint account. Basically, that means that instead of the bank covering whatever money the hackers made off with, you'd just be out the cash altogether.

There's the possibility that Mint could be held liable for your information being stolen but since there haven't been any breaches reported to date, there's no way to know how the situation would pan out. If you're thinking of signing up for a Mint account and you're worried about a security threat, you should check with your bank first to find out what the consequences would be if your cyber thieves make off with your information. It may not be an easy document to decipher, but it's publicly available on their website and should contain everything you need to know about having an account with Mint.

Taking everything we've outlined into account, Mint is a top choice for a safe, easy-to-use personal finance tool. Mint provides multiple ways for you to create and manage a budget. Debt Management. Money Management. Checking Accounts. Retirement Planning. Your Privacy Rights. To change or withdraw your consent choices for Investopedia. At any time, you can update your settings through the "EU Privacy" link at the bottom of any page. These choices will be signaled globally to our partners and will not affect browsing data.

We and our partners process data to: Actively scan device characteristics for identification. I Accept Show Purposes. Your Money. Personal Finance. Your Practice. Popular Courses. Mint also tracks the performance of investments and sends alerts on any suspicious activity.

So I had to re-open my account and eliminate my bank account info, and close it again. Just keep putting all your finances online, just keep doing it and I lay money on the table — there will be a day it will be hacked.

All your info that laid on that could server is gone, in the hands of someone in a foreign land. Let me keep my information on my computer, with the password stored safely inside my little head. Spammers, and scammers, purport to represent all kinds of companies, from major banks or credit unions to companies like PayPal, eBay, and Mint. Just right after I registered my account with mint. After this happened, I deleted my account, changed passwords for my 2 banks. Same thing happened to me when I just subscribed to Netflix then few days later I received an email from fake Netflix to update my payment info.

I think these scammers are working in those companies even if contract working outside. Moreover, it would be nearly impossible for them to find this out. The problem is that if your bank account is hacked and they find you have a Mint. The bank would not reimburse him so he was just out the money. Can anyone give me an opinion on how safe they think this would be when linked solely to a credit card?

This is a non-issue with strong passwords. A mint breach would actually not be a big deal if my banks offered physical security token authentication for any withdraws that were not done via check or atm card.

That way even if they were able to log into my account they could not transfer any money unless they someone broke the banks servers which kept my specific security token or physically stole my token.

I have been told this it normal practice for consumers in European banks. I believe that perhaps private information should remain private and not stored or viewed by anyone else than the actual owner of the information. Doug is right. Banks would rather you use their dashboard and import all of your other accounts to their convenient PFM software because they will use the information to market products to you.

I know this because I work for a bank and just sat through a demo of software that would give that capability to our marketing department. I feel you. Now that Mint. They went from the relative safety of read-only to murky land of read-write.

On a side note, I have yet to find a local application that acts like Mint with regard to online accounts. I want a solution that simply shows my current balance from my bank and uses the transactions simply for budgeting.

This article applies only to Canada. In the US, under federal regulations, banks are liable for any unauthorized spending even if the user transmits the login information to a third party as long as the user did not authorize the third party to conduct transactions. Similarly, they also partner with SecureKey Concierge and the Government of Canada to use your online banking sign-in details to access Government of Canada services.

Crap software. Anyone using Wifi on their PC or other device can be hacked. Quicken needs some good competition. I may try Mint, as others rated it pretty good. This should be a technical solution. OAuth2 is a mechanism that most tech services like Google, Microsoft, Facebook, etcetera utilize for a user to allow a third party to access content from their site. In this case, it would be the banks providing OAuth2 capabilities for integration with Mint. Banks probably do not want to create this capability.

They would blame OAuth2 for not being sufficiently secure. But, this is likely a red herring argument to disguise the real reason: banks want you visiting their sites so they can sell you new services. Now you can sleep at night. The article makes no sense, whenever it was published.

By a long shot. Easy fix, no advancements on that. Does merely closing the mint account resolve the issue with the banks so that you become protected for fraud again?

Or are there any further steps you must take? Note that in the Privacy Statement mint. Just because you have nothing to hide does not make this violation of the 4th Amendment okay. Such 3rd parties will assume responsibility for the personal information collected by us in connection with our business operations or through our Sites and such third parties will assume the rights and obligations regarding such information as described in this Mint Privacy Statement.

Mint does not have your passwords. They have a unique, unencryptable hash key that was created by your bank account in order to connect Mint to your bank. That API key can only access certain bank info in a read only format. When I signed up to Mint a while back I tested this theory: 1.

Enter your bank details into Mint. Wait until Mint syncs your transactions to make sure everything is working.

Go and change your banking password. The Mint sync is now broken because Mint is using your old password to try and connect. Dylan, I think the bank has to invalidate the token if you change your password. Otherwise, the company using the token would have access forever. They offer a unique password that only allows read only access to your bank. This is the code you give Mint instead of your real password so your money is in no danger. Hang on a second.

If they only got into your Mint account they would still be able to gather enough personal information to then call your bank and impersonate you. Again thanks for the response.

Where your bank will not cover you, your personal insurance may! I am not sure if they would have an issue with the banking passwords on third-party sites and deny you coverage however.

I may have to look into that a little deeper as an article idea! What robmausser says just above. You are more likely to have your bank account compromised by malware you unknowingly download to your PC or by phone and internet scams than by Mint getting compromised.

This is because its a one way street. Mint is only allowed from the API that is what your bank uses to add their service to Mint to view the status of your funds and transactions. Thats it. Now, someone could hack Mint but all they would get would be your financial history, which may be unsettling to you. But they could never get your money. I know you add your banks to Mint by logging into your bank information on that add account page, but that is being handled by your bank, not with Mint.

Once you log in, your bank gives Mint a special access hash that is unique to you, your bank and Mint. It would be much easier for them to do it straight from your online bank websites, which I am sure you now log into individually on your computer.

If I was a hacker trying to take your money, I would much prefer this approach. You are actually making yourself more vulnerable by using each of your online banking websites rather than just Mint! It is more likely that your computer will get infected while you are browsing the internet for whatever you browse for, and that your credentials will be stolen that way.

Mint and all the other budgeting apps encrypt your passwords. So even if they were hacked, now the hackers have to crack encryption to get your password. So when you go to login, you have to use your password and another piece of information that is only good for one use. Some banks give you a little device with numbers on it that change every few seconds, other banks text you a code to your phone.

Other banks only allow access from a specific IP address or a specific computer. So even if mint. I like the comments everyone has made, and Young, you bring up some great points, i just wanted to let everyone know that there are some things you can do to lower the likelyhood of getting hacked.

Also, protect your email account. I mean, you receive statements and account info in your email right? How many of us have gone paperless? Use multifactor for your password and tell your banks to enrypt and password protect your statements when they send them to you. My question to you is — what are you using now? Is there something you recommend? I read your concerns about mint.

Maybe there is an app opportunity there for you? Check out our website and let me know what you think! Absolutely valid concern, however there are banks that allow to create a read-only guest account which works great for third-party applications like Mint. And if there are some destructive actions made through read-only guest account which functionality is provided by the bank , the bank is responsible for it.

The really stupid thing is that there are lots of ways that something like Mint could be done without having to give it your banking password. The banks would have to get onboard with the idea that you should be able to give your info to third party websites via their website. The problem is with the banks, not with Mint. For the record, I do use Mint, but just for my credit cards and one chequing account. If those were hacked, it could be a pain, but my financial loss would be quite limited.

I originally had these same concerns. But since then, my financial institutions have added the third layer of protection to their website. The third layer requires you to enter a security key or secret question if you log on from an unrecognized computer. In consideration of UBS complying with your request to enroll in this service, by entering your OLS User Name and password and by clicking the box below, you agree to hold UBS harmless from any loss or damages that you may incur as a result of providing Intuit with your User Name and password, including mistaken identity, unauthorized access to your account, unauthorized use of Bill Pay, Funds Transfer and other means to transfer money and securities, unauthorized acquisition and use of your personal information by others who may access your accounts via OLS.

I work in information security. Even if a breach occurs at a third party, if money is stolen from you, your bank should replace it and run an investigation. Fraud is fraud no matter where it comes from. I use Mint for all my information and have no intention of stopping. Bobby, this is incorrect. If you give away your login details to a third party, you forfeit any protection the bank offers. There was a story years ago of a Canadian who was victim of fraud and never got a penny from the bank because he admitted that his wife knew his PIN.