Understand financial backups and restores
Review saved household snapshots, their contents and limits, and the effects of restoring.
Overview
Backups are saved snapshots of household financial data inside Novice Money. Only household Owners can manage them. A snapshot captures selected contents at a point in time; it is not a continuously updated copy or a portable recovery guarantee.
Create and review a snapshot
- Open Backups and confirm the household.
- Review the displayed count and storage allowances.
- When you intend to create a backup, choose Add New and enter a useful label.
- Keep the required core records and select any optional Debt Snowball or history contents, then save.
- Use Review backup to inspect its date, counts, format, and included contents.
The created time is labeled UTC. Format supported means the application recognizes the format; integrity is checked before restore, not proved by the review screen alone.
Before restoring
Restoring into the current household replaces its financial data. It does not merge only the missing entries. Excluded history is cleared, and a backup without Debt Snowball contents clears the destination debt plan and links. Affected Beacons must be paired again.
Read the destination and all warnings. Where offered, copying to another household requires an eligible empty household you own. Restore actions require the exact confirmation word and your current password.
Replacing existing finances includes a safety snapshot in the application's restore workflow and can require available backup capacity. Treat this as part of the restore decision, not as a reason to experiment with live data.
Troubleshooting and destructive actions
If capacity is full or a creation cooldown applies, follow the displayed limit. Delete only a backup you have deliberately decided is no longer needed.
Delete backup removes that saved snapshot, not current financial records. Clear financial data is a separate destructive action, not a refresh or repair button. It retains sign-in credentials, roles, household access, and saved backups, but clears financial records and debt data.