match weekly receipts to the sheet you already keep

the message

every monday at 9, compare receipts from the previous monday through sunday with my expense sheet. use only the gmail and outlook accounts i name, and the google sheets file, tab and range i give you.

read the receipt messages and accessible attachments. compare merchant, transaction date, total, currency and receipt reference with the sheet. don't match on amount alone. distinguish the receipt date from the date the email arrived.

return four groups in this chat: receipts with a clear matching row, sheet rows with no receipt found, receipts with no matching row, and uncertain or possible duplicate records. include the sheet row and message reference for each proposed match. keep refunds separate from purchases. flag unreadable or missing amounts; don't guess them.

don't change the sheet, label or move mail, pay anything or contact suppliers. if both sources cannot be read, say the comparison is incomplete.

when

mondays at 9:00, reviewing the previous monday through sunday in your chosen time zone

needs

gmail or outlook, or both, plus google sheets; read-only access and a named expense range with merchant, date, amount and currency columns

what comes back

an example, not a real run

weekly receipt comparison for priya
clear match: acme supplies receipt a17, usd 42.00, matches expenses row 18 on merchant, transaction date and reference.
no receipt found: row 21, sam's print shop, usd 18.00. the inbox search is not proof it was never issued.
no sheet row found: acme supplies receipt a22, usd 12.00.
uncertain: two acme emails show receipt a17; likely copies of the same receipt, not two expenses.
coverage: work gmail and work outlook read; expenses rows 2 to 40 read. no records changed.

make it yours

• choose the account labels explicitly so a personal purchase does not enter a business expense review
• name the date column and what it means; transaction date and statement posting date should not silently be treated as identical
• provide merchant aliases you already know, while requiring the bot to explain any new proposed alias
• use a longer lookback for late receipts, keeping the transaction window separate from the email search window
• ask for exceptions only once clear matches are consistently easy to check

when it goes wrong

• equal amounts get matched to unrelated merchants. require several agreeing fields and put weak matches in the uncertain group rather than choosing the nearest row.
• a scan or attachment cannot be read. keep its message reference in the review list and inspect it yourself; a blank amount must not become zero.
• the same receipt arrived in both mailboxes. compare the receipt reference and transaction details before counting it twice. a forwarded copy is not necessarily a second purchase.
• an expense has no email match because its receipt is elsewhere. record the search scope and check your other records. this is not a bank reconciliation or proof that every expense is accounted for.

match first, change the ledger later

the gmail page has a smaller friday sweep that labels messages and lists amounts. this routine does a different job: comparing receipt evidence with existing expense rows, including mail from outlook. it leaves both sources unchanged.

on read only, the bot reads the google sheet with Look up spreadsheet row and Get Spreadsheet by Data Filter; test the first run.⁵ identify the exact tab and range before scheduling the sweep. keep sheets and mail read-only and tell the bot not to change any row. you decide what to enter after checking the evidence, including currency and refund treatment.