mint.com’s spending by category chart Click the photo to see enlarged version.

LITTLE ROCK — In online money management there are generally a couple different schools of thought. There are folks who’ve managed their bank accounts, credit cards, stocks and budgets online for years, and when asked about the pros and cons they shrug, suspiciously raise their eyebrows and ask, “who doesn’t manage their money online?”

There are those folks who get all knotted up and sweaty at the thought of pulling all of their financial accounts into one online tracking system. They are just as suspicious of those folks who would track something as personal and private as finances through the World Wide Web. I call them the I-don’t-know-what-kind-of-people-are-running-that-Web-site-and-I’m-not-going-to-give-my-information-to-those-money-grubbing-evil-trolls people.

Then there are folks like my dear sweet mother who are still scribbling entries into their paper check register. They even do something called “balancing the checkbook” each month, which I imagine to be something akin to maneuvering atop a bongo board while juggling the checkbook, a pen and a calculator.

I’ve managed to avoid the circus act of “balancing a check book” most of my banking life, much to the chagrin of foresaid mother. There were a couple of blemishes in my record when I decided to “get on track,” but those cases were few and far between.

So while I am a bit late to the online banking game, it is not for any of the usual reasons of fearful suspicion or because I have a good game plan already in place. Instead, I have taken the “don’t ask, don’t tell” approach that requires no money management system: I don’t ask my husband how much money we have in various accounts and then I don’t tell him when I spend that money.

I figure it’s a great way to keep the mystery and suspense alive in a long-term relationship.

Fortunately for the spouse’s sanity, the market has become so saturated with these online money management systems that I figured it time for a review of some of the best to help Sync readers sort out the pros and cons of each. The plan was for me to try some of the most reputable services so that readers won’t have to go through the hassle of trying out more than one. Switching financial management systems is akin to switching banks — an activity that most of my friends and family members would consider only when held at gunpoint.

Unfortunately for my own sanity, this has now made me quite aware of my wayward spending habits and provided a not-so-great subject of discourse nearly every night. The idea behind online money management is that it saves you time and money by giving you quick snapshots of your financial picture so you can plan wisely and easily for the future. It may save us money, but I doubt it will save us any time.

My husband and I have found the charts and graphs hypnotic and addictive. We can easily spend hours dissecting money spent and tracking how much we have left in dozens of budget categories. I think he giggles inwardly when he clicks on the graph that shows my spending versus his spending. Reviewing mind-numbing, color-coded charts over a glass of wine is our new bonding activity of choice.

the minty fresh approach

Mint is the No. 1 rated online money management site and it’s easy to see why. This site is one of the oldest of its kind and usually that can go in just two ways — either they manage to work out early kinks and now provide the best product around or they lay dormant and let newcomers to the field get ahead.

Although I had expected some of the newer sites that have come onto the scene to outperform Mint in various areas, it just didn’t happen. Mint was the easiest to use and had few, if any glitches, while uploading all of our accounts. It provides simple ways to look at one’s finances in a variety of ways. The user interface works so easily it requires no training or tutorial. In minutes, I was up and running with all of our credit cards, bank accounts and loans.

The only thing that took any time at all was coding our bank transactions, which was still much easier than with any of the other sites I tested. Savvy recognition techniques allowed for automatic categorization of hundreds of transactions, both for past and future entries.

A snappy, easy-to-use, free iPhone application makes it convenient to fret over your finances while sitting in that boring meeting.

I wish Mint provided a way to set up bill pay from Mint so that I could always work from the Mint interface rather than switching back to the bank’s clunky Web site.

One last request would be for a way to see projections into the future. As of now, you can only see what you have currently spent. It would be great to know how much you are projected to spend on various categories for months and years to come. For example, Mint has a great little chart that shows how one’s net worth is trending over several months. It would be insightful if we could see, based on spending, what our net worth would be over the next six months.

Mint.com is one of the few sites that offers a complete portfolio of services with no upgrade charges or monthly fees. However, they’ve got a business to run, so users should be wary of some of their cost-saving suggestions, which are often sponsored (read: paid advertising) by credit card companies. That doesn’t mean those suggestions won’t work, and Mint does clearly label sponsored suggestions, but users should proceed with caution.

the group tactic

A few of the online systems took the “let’s do it together and it won’t be so painful” approach. Among the more notable versions of this social, Web 2.0 approach to finances are Wesabe.com and Geezeo.com.

Geezeo provides user forums to get advice on saving your money. Users can post questions like, “do you know a credit card with a great low interest rate” and see what other Geezeo users have to say. Of course your finances aren’t public, but depending on how comfortable you are with asking questions of the general public, other details of your financial woes can be.

I expected Wesabe.com to outperform all of the sites, given recent feedback and media reviews. Widgets for the Mac and PC desktop, a Wesabe Uploader and an app for the iPhone had me convinced they had thought of all the conveniences needed.

But I was less than impressed. I could never get Wesabe to recognize my bank account for an automatic import, even though my bank was among their list of bank choices. I eventually did a manual import, which was a pain compare to the simplicity of Mint.

Wesabe’s budgeting techniques took some getting used to. Instead of setting up categories of spending, users set up tags. This sounds nice in the beginning, but developing consistency for future planning is nearly impossible when you’ve got 90+ random tags.

Wesabe could tell me very little about my budget without a tedious tagging process for which there seemed to be no way to automate the process. It was incredibly frustrating to have to go through and manually tag each and every entry for the year.

the old faithful plan

Quicken Online will feel comfortable and familiar for many who have used its desktop-based software programs. Both Quicken and Mint came into the online financial management world around the same time in 2007. Before then, you may have been one of the many who paid for its desktop software that did pretty much the same thing. Now you can do it online for free.

Good budgeting features show monthly averages and Quicken allows for input of manual transactions that haven’t happened yet. If that’s important to you, that’s a feature many of the other sites don’t have. It also shows very clearly how much cash you have left after future obligations for the budgeting cycle are met. This feature is pretty handy for those who don’t like to do math in our heads.

the mom and dad tactic

If you’re just learning how to manage your money (which many of you may think fits the bill for me given my previous description), then justthrive.com may be by perfect for you. It’s elementary reminders that “I have too much debt” and “you’re overspending” and “you need to slow down” were annoying. Thrive was demanding and pushy before I set one budget so I’m not sure what it based it’s nagging on. A vibrant design and young models on the front made it fun to look at, but the pretty package was void of serious content. But if users want the familiar feeling of Mom and Dad’s oversight, then Thrive is for you.

even more to consider

I’ve covered some of the top free financial sites, but there are dozens of other options. Some like clearcheckbook.com and buxfer.com offer free services for budgeting basics. Monthly fees are tacked on should you want to explore projecting, investing or just adding a slew of accounts.