Snap a receipt, skip the data entry

Receipts pile up fast: in your wallet, your car, the bottom of your bag. Typing each one into a spreadsheet is the kind of task that never feels urgent until tax time. Here's a simple way to turn a stack of receipt photos into a tidy list you can drop straight into your spreadsheet.

What you'll need

• Your phone's camera
• A free ChatGPT account (it can read photos)
• The expense categories you already use, or the ones your bookkeeper asked for

Steps

1. Lay a few receipts flat in good light and take a clear photo of each one.
2. Open ChatGPT and attach the photos.
3. Copy the prompt below, add your categories, and send it.
4. Check the list against your receipts. Fix any amount or date that looks off.
5. Copy the table into your spreadsheet or bookkeeping app.
6. File or toss the paper receipts, depending on what your accountant recommends.

I've attached photos of receipts from my small business.
For each receipt, list: date, store name, total amount, and the best category from this list:
[your categories, for example: supplies, shipping, software, meals, travel]
Put the results in a table I can copy into a spreadsheet.
If anything is hard to read, write "check" instead of guessing.

A few tips

• Double-check the numbers. AI is good at reading receipts, but faded ink and crumpled paper can trip it up. A quick look takes seconds.
• Do it weekly. Five receipts on a Friday is easy. Two hundred in April is not.
• Mind what you share. Receipts can include part of a card number. Crop that out if it shows, and don't upload anything you'd rather keep private.

This one is rated Medium only because it takes a couple of tries to get the photos right. After that, it's a ten minute habit that makes tax season a lot calmer.