Joe says "Hell, I get my bank balance at the bottom of every ATM receipt." So... One day, Joe owes his buddy $50.00 and his last ATM receipt says he has $67.39, so he pulls $60.00 to pay his debit in full. Two days later Joe checks his balance and it to his surprise it reads "-55.56". He, of course he expected $7.39 for his balance. What he 'forgot' was the 12.95 monthly checking fee his bank charges. If Joe had even the simplest of a check register and had the fore thought to put an entry in for the expected future fee or other future debits, he would have been saved the $50.00 overdraft fee.
+67.39 Balance
-60.00 ATM withdrawal
-12.95 Monthly fee ARGH!
-50.00 Overdraft Fee
-------
-55.56 Balance

Susie's monthly bills vary a bit each month so she can't pay the same amount each month. To figure out what she should pay each month, Susie decides to create account item in her register for all of her known future bills for the next 2 years. For each of these, she estimates a bit high to make sure the value is always lowered in her register yielding unexpected 'extra' money. Susie feels comfortable that she will make sure that she has a total $200.00 left in her account at the end of every pay period. She knows she would never have a normal bill that exceeds this amount except for her car payment and rent payment. These are amounts that don't change each month. After that she adds an entry for her 'guess-ta-mation' (in the absence of a real value, estimate the darn best you can!) of what her pay might be each period. Be sure to use the low end so that any extra hours worked or bonus received (in her dreams) is again... Extra Yeah! (remember our goal? the creditcard?) Then she adds an entry every month adjusting the registers balance so that no future balance is ever less than the decided upon $200.00. Susie is now happy to find out that she will have her credit card paid off before the thought.