…but not really.

I have encountered two human factors issues lately that have left me confused — some for far too long.

The first of these is with Google Analytics. I used Analytics to find out if there are actually people viewing my site and where these people are from. However, I recently updated the theme for my website, and forgot to include the Analytics tracking code.

It should have been obvious, when right around the same time I rolled out the changes, Analytics kept telling me no one at all was visiting my site, but I also hadn’t posted a new entry in a while, so I thought perhaps there really was no one visiting my site. I even saw a few people visit my site, and I simply believed they had a way around the tracking code. It didn’t occur to me that anything was wrong.

Until last night, I finally realized it, a month later, that the tracking code wasn’t out there anywhere on the web. And then this morning, coincidentally, Analytics finally decides to display a warning icon, that perhaps something is wrong with the data feed. Only a month after the tracking code disappeared.

To top that off, some places on the site still say “Receiving Data,” even though this was false. Then, of course, it will take 24 hours to get rid of the warning icon.

I also had a brief moment of panic when I looked at my Mint.com account today. I have only been using Mint for about a week, because I have only recently stopped using my old local bank account that doesn’t work with Mint. But after spending the weekend away from the internet, I come online to find that my card was used for a $5 purchase at Subway. Someone was eating a $5 foot-long on my dime!

I quickly realized that a “Subway” charge was not a fast-food chain, as Mint had assumed, but really a public transportation charge. Whew. But it doesn’t help that Mint automatically categorizes the expenditure without giving a level of confidence in its guess.

In a few days I will have another “Subway” charge, so then I will see if Mint is able to recognize it as the same type of purchase and accurately mark it as public transportation. In the meantime, I will be on the lookout for other features of Mint.com that either help or hurt my money management practices. There are tons of different things that Mint can do, and I am only beginning to graze the surface.