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What to write to us about

We are a small independent site — one editor, no support desk — so every message goes to a person rather than a ticket queue. That means we genuinely read all of them, and also that a little context in your first message saves a round trip. These are the things people most often write in about, and what we need to help.

Corrections and calculator bugs

Corrections are the most valuable mail we get, and we treat them as a priority over everything else in the inbox. If a result looks wrong, tell us the calculator name, the exact inputs you entered, the result the page gave, and the result you expected. If you checked the figure against another source — a lender's amortization schedule, an IRS worksheet, a textbook formula, a published clinical equation — naming that source helps enormously, because most disagreements turn out to be a difference in assumptions rather than an arithmetic error.

Common examples of assumption mismatches: a mortgage figure that excludes PMI, a paycheck estimate that uses the standard deduction when you itemize, a calorie equation that uses Mifflin-St Jeor where another site uses Harris-Benedict, or a date calculation that counts the start day differently than your contract does. When that is what happened, we usually respond by making the assumption more explicit on the page rather than changing the math. When the math really is wrong, we fix it and note the correction date on the page.

Suggesting a new calculator

We add tools every week, and reader requests drive a large share of them. The suggestions that get built fastest describe a specific decision someone is trying to make rather than just a topic — "I need to compare a 15-year to a 30-year mortgage including the tax deduction" is far more actionable than "a mortgage tool." Tell us what inputs you have and what number you wish you had at the end.

There is a dedicated form for this at our request a calculator page, which routes into the same inbox but captures the details in a structured way. Either route works.

Advertising, partnerships, and press

The site is supported by display advertising, and we do not sell direct placements, sponsored posts, paid links, or guest articles. We turn these down consistently — not as a negotiating position but because paid editorial placement is incompatible with being a reference source people can trust, and with the advertising policies we operate under. Link-exchange requests receive the same answer.

Journalists and researchers are welcome to quote or cite any calculator, methodology note, or explanatory section on the site with attribution. If you need clarification on how a particular formula is implemented, or a comment on methodology, write in and we will respond. We are also happy to confirm figures before publication.

Privacy questions and data requests

Calculators on this site run entirely in your browser. The numbers you type into a mortgage, health, or salary tool are never transmitted to us and never stored on a server — you can verify this by disconnecting from the network and watching the calculators continue to work. Because of that, we usually hold no personal data about a visitor at all.

The exceptions are the information you deliberately send us through this form or by email, and the anonymous analytics and advertising cookies described in our privacy policy. If you want a copy of what we hold, or want it deleted, email us and say so plainly — no particular legal formula is required, and we do not require you to explain why. We aim to complete these within 30 days.

What to expect after you write

Most messages get a reply within one to two business days. Corrections that require re-deriving a formula or checking a regulation can take longer, and we will tell you if that is the case rather than leaving you waiting. We do not use an autoresponder, so a reply from us is a reply from a person.

A few things we cannot do, so you know before writing: we cannot give individual financial, tax, legal, or medical advice, and we cannot tell you what decision to make in your specific situation. That is not modesty — it is the line between publishing a reference tool and practicing a licensed profession. For anything consequential, take our output to a professional who can review your full circumstances. The reasoning behind that boundary is set out in our calculator disclaimer, and the process we follow when building and reviewing pages is documented in our editorial policy.

If you wrote in and did not hear back within a week, the message very likely landed in a spam folder on one side or the other. Send it again, or email Larius@thehandycalculators.com directly — persistence is welcome, not an imposition.

Accessibility and technical problems

We want every calculator to be usable with a keyboard alone, with a screen reader, at 200% browser zoom, and on a phone in bright sunlight. Every tool is built with labelled form controls, live-region announcements for results, and visible focus indicators, and we test the coverage automatically as part of our build process. Automated testing catches structural problems but not awkwardness, so if something is technically compliant and still difficult to use, that is worth telling us about.

For a technical report, the two details that help most are your browser and version, and your operating system — a layout bug in Safari on iOS often does not reproduce in Chrome on Windows, and knowing which combination you are on saves us guessing. A screenshot is useful when something looks wrong; the exact inputs are more useful when something calculates wrong. If a page will not load at all, tell us whether other pages on the site load, since that distinguishes a broken page from a network or extension problem.

Answers to questions we get most often

Are the calculators free, and is there a catch? They are free, there is no account to create, and there is no premium tier holding back the useful features. The site is funded by display advertising, and that is the entire business model. We do not run affiliate links to lenders, insurers, or supplement companies, which is why you will not find a "compare offers" table anywhere on the site.

Can I embed a calculator on my own website? Yes. Several tools are available as embeddable widgets you can configure and drop into your own page, and we are happy to add more on request. Schools, libraries, and non-profits use these regularly, and there is no cost or license fee.

Do you save what I type into a calculator? No. The math runs in your browser, and the numbers never leave your device. Some tools remember your last inputs locally so the page is not blank when you return, but that data stays in your own browser storage and clearing your browser data removes it.

Why does your result differ from another site's? Almost always because of a different assumption rather than a different calculation — a different equation variant, a different rounding convention, or an included cost that the other page excludes. Each page documents the formula it uses, and if the difference still does not make sense, send us both numbers and we will work out which assumption diverged.

Can I use your calculators in a classroom or a published article? Yes, with attribution and no permission needed. Teachers use these in lesson plans, journalists cite them in reporting, and we are glad to confirm methodology details for either.