Welcome
Tiller is the only personal finance service built on Google Sheets and Microsoft Excel.
Each day Tiller automates the latest spending, income, transfers, and account balances from your linked accounts into a private spreadsheet.
Flexible pre-built templates help you track cash flow, budgets, debt, and net worth.
We chose to automate spreadsheets rather than build yet another app, because spreadsheets are the most flexible, trusted, and collaborative tool for managing money.
Tiller is unique in supporting collaborative work between financial professionals and their clients–you can share access to a spreadsheet without the hassle of locking data into a proprietary platform.
Learn more about what makes Tiller different in this video tour with Tiller founder Peter Polson.
About
Many financial professionals have already adopted Tiller into their practices.
In this guide, we’ll share best practices for using Tiller with clients and answer common questions from financial professionals.
For general help with getting started and using Tiller, visit our help center.
Do you use Tiller with your clients? Complete this form to join Tiller’s Directory of Financial Professionals.
Onboarding Overview
How your client will get started with Tiller.
Your client will create a Tiller subscription, connect their financial accounts, and create a new Tiller-powered spreadsheet.
What your client will need to get started with Tiller
A Google account or a Microsoft account to sign into Tiller. Learn more about Tiller's authentication options.
Payment method. Though payment information is required to start a free trial, the annual subscription charge is not processed until the end of the free trial.
Credentials and security codes to securely add their financial accounts to Tiller. Learn more in Tiller’s security promise.
Step 1: Create a Tiller account
Start a free trial by signing into the Tiller Console with a Google account or Microsoft account.
Tiller uses authentication through Google and Microsoft because it’s safe, secure, and collaborative—and most people already have one of these accounts.
We hope to offer more authentication options in the future.
Step 2: Start the free trial
Enter payment credentials to start the free trial. Learn more about how Tiller’s free trial works.
Step 3: Connect financial accounts
Choose a financial institution and enter credentials when prompted by typing them manually. Complete any additional MFA security prompts, as required by the institution.
Tiller’s data feeds are provided by Yodlee, the trusted industry leader for data aggregation. Yodlee supports over 20,000 financial institutions so it’s likely we’ll be able to support most accounts.
If you run into issues connecting an account, try these Add Account troubleshooting tips.
Step 4: Create a Tiller-powered spreadsheet
On the Tiller Console, click Create a spreadsheet and choose a spreadsheet platform.
We recommend Google Sheets for ease of collaboration between financial professionals and their clients.
It’s possible to create up to 5 separate spreadsheets powered by Tiller with a single Tiller subscription—and that can be a mix of Google Sheets and Excel workbooks.
You’ll choose which accounts you want to link to each spreadsheet.
Step 5: Share the spreadsheet
Your client can share their spreadsheet with you using the built-in collaboration features of Google Sheets.
Before Onboarding Clients to Tiller
Is Tiller right for my clients?
Tiller is a great fit for clients who want to be involved in managing their money in a spreadsheet.
We support Google Sheets and Microsoft Excel.
Google Sheets or Excel?
If collaboration is important, we recommend choosing Google Sheets as your spreadsheet platform since it's a bit simpler to use collaboratively.
If you prefer Microsoft Excel, or you’re still not sure which platform to choose, review the differences between using Tiller with Google Sheets and Excel.
Which template should I use?
Most customers prefer to start in the Foundation Template. It's available for both Google Sheets and Microsoft Excel.
Tiller Foundation Template
Learn more about the Foundation Template, our recommended starting point.
With the Foundation Template as a starting point, you can insert additional sheets to the spreadsheet to customize the experience.
Your own custom template
Alternatively, start in your own template for Google Sheets or Excel that works with Tiller Money Feeds.
Beyond the Tiller Foundation Template
Explore community-built templates in the Template Gallery.
Most are compatible with the Foundation Template–they can be added to your existing Foundation Template spreadsheet. Because Tiller is based in a spreadsheet, customization possibilities are powerful.
Get inspired and discuss customization possibilities and workflows in the Tiller Community.
Who owns the spreadsheet and where is it stored?
Your client. If they discontinue their Tiller subscription, they will retain the spreadsheet file and the data within it.
Google Sheets
A Tiller-powered Google Sheet is stored in the Google Drive of the Google account used to subscribe to Tiller. The owner has the ultimate power/access over the Google Sheet and can restrict, remove, or deny access of other Google users.
Microsoft Excel
A Tiller-powered Excel workbook can be stored locally on your client’s computer or saved to their OneDrive in the cloud. Be sure to pay attention to where the file gets saved.
What will my client need to do to keep data flowing into the spreadsheet?
Sign into the Tiller Console to refresh the connection to linked financial institutions.
Tiller can only pull new data if a successful refresh occurs with the linked financial institutions. Some institutions experience periodic security-related disconnections, which prevent successful refreshes.
In those cases, the client will re-authenticate by entering their credentials and provide security codes to refresh successfully.
Use Tiller Money Feeds to fill their spreadsheet with fresh data.
After a successful refresh, the client will click Fill in the Tiller Money Feeds add-in/add-on to load new data into the spreadsheet.
For Google Sheets, toggle on the Autofill feature to automatically fill the spreadsheet once per day with new data.
For Microsoft Excel, there is currently no Auto Fill feature so your client will click Fill to load new data into an Excel workbook.
Can I refresh the bank connections and fill the spreadsheet for my client?
Only if your client signed up for Tiller using a shared Google account or Microsoft account and shared the password with you.
The Tiller Console, the Tiller Money Feeds add-on for Google Sheets, and Tiller Money Feeds add-in for Excel require logging in using the credentials for the Google account or Microsoft account that was used to sign up for Tiller.
The Tiller Community Solutions add-on for Google Sheets (where you’ll find additional community-built templates, tools, and workflows) does NOT require signing in with your Tiller-subscribed Google account or Microsoft account.
Subscription Management
Each client will need their own Tiller subscription. We do not currently have a way for financial professionals to view and manage their clients' subscriptions.
Bulk subscription discounts are not available.
Billing
We process payment for Tiller subscriptions through each client’s individual Tiller Console.
Management of Client Spreadsheets
Turning Off Feeds
If your client unlinks a sheet, it will no longer be connected to the feeds or visible from the Tiller Console, but the spreadsheet file will remain in their Google Drive (Google Sheets) or their OneDrive/saved locally to their computer (Microsoft Excel).
Deleting Spreadsheets
The owner of the spreadsheet can delete any Tiller-powered spreadsheet.
Workflows for Financial Professionals
Tiller understands the challenges of implementing an efficient workflow for a large number of clients and we’re excited to continue adding resources for financial professionals as we grow.
Here are some popular ways financial professionals are adding value for their clients with Tiller.
Adding custom dashboards or sheets to the spreadsheet
If you’ve built your own custom dashboard or report, you can integrate it into your client’s existing Tiller-powered spreadsheet.
Google Sheets
Gain edit access to the client’s Google Sheet (if you haven’t already) and copy the URL.
Open your custom dashboard/report and right click the tab.
Choose “Copy to.”
Paste the URL of your client’s Google Sheet into the bottom of the window that appears.
Navigate back to the client’s sheet and update the tab name from “copy of…” to whatever the appropriate name is.
Microsoft Excel
Your clients can link your custom-built Excel workbook to Tiller.
Reports and deliverables
Tiller makes it easy to generate reports and insights for your clients from their Tiller-powered spreadsheet.
Tiller Community Solutions Add-on (Google Sheets only)
It's where you'll find additional templates to customize and extend the core functionality of the Foundation Template. Find solutions for debt payoff planning, tracking savings goals, even run a P&L report, and more.
If you have edit access to your client’s Google Sheet, you can install the Tiller Community Solutions add-on to add these additional templates and tools on their behalf.
Unlike the Tiller Money Feeds add-on, the Tiller Community Solutions add-on does not require signing in to the Google account associated with the Tiller subscription.
Tiller Community Show & Tell
Explore more community-built templates, formulas, or workflows leveraging Tiller's data feeds (or share your own).
Managing Data in the Spreadsheet
Any tab in a Google Sheet can be quickly exported to a PDF from the File menu.
Google Sheets has a robust Version History feature. Read more about Google Sheets’ version history and restoring spreadsheets in the Tiller Help Center.
Microsoft Excel workbooks stored on OneDrive also have some versioning capability.
Data Storage
Transaction and balance history data is stored and accumulated on Tiller’s servers.
Deleting data in a Tiller-powered spreadsheet does not delete the data on the servers or remove it from another spreadsheet where it already exists.
When a new spreadsheet is created, you choose which accounts are linked to it. On the first fill of the spreadsheet, any data Tiller has pulled from a linked account will be fed into the new Tiller-powered spreadsheet.
Data Privacy and Security
Security and privacy are top priorities for us at Tiller. Our business model is based on customer subscriptions, not on selling customer data to third parties.
We do not see nor store bank credentials. Our data feeds are provided by Yodlee, the trusted industry leader for financial data aggregation that provides the same service to 9 of the 15 largest U.S. banks.
Your client’s credentials are encrypted in the browser and passed directly to Yodlee.
Yodlee provides a read-only token granting Tiller’s servers visibility into your client’s transactions. We use bank-grade 256-bit AES encryption to feed bank data to Google Sheets and Excel workbooks.
We also can’t see personal transactions or balance data.
Read more about Tiller’s security at Tiller Security And Privacy Promise.
Read more about Yodlee’s security at Security Office of Envestnet | Yodlee.
Tiller Support
Resources
Your first stop for troubleshooting. Review the most common questions while getting started with Tiller.
Popular ways to participate: Start or join a conversation about money. Share and explore custom Tiller solutions for Google Sheets or Microsoft Excel.
Helpful human support via email or asynchronous chat.
Assisting your clients with troubleshooting
Your client reach out to Tiller support via the blue support chat widget that appears in the lower right corner of the Tiller Console when they are logged in.
If you are facilitating troubleshooting on your client’s behalf, send an email to support@tillerhq.com.
Please include:
The email account associated with the Tiller subscription
Details about the error or issue, including the name of the institution, which accounts are affected, transaction dates, error messages, etc. Screenshots are helpful.