There's a lunch receipt in your coat pocket, a hardware store one on the car seat and a hotel bill somewhere in your bag. By the time you do your expenses, half of them are crumpled and fading. Scan each one on your iPhone when you get it, and you keep a copy whatever happens to the paper. This guide covers what's worth keeping from a receipt, then how to scan, sort and report on your receipts with Receipt Cat, our receipt app for iPhone and iPad.
What to keep from a receipt
Most expense reports need the same few things:
- Who you paid: the store, restaurant or business.
- When: the date on the receipt.
- How much: the total, in the currency you paid in, and the tax or VAT if it's shown.
- What it was for: a category such as meals or travel, and whether it was business or personal.
- The receipt itself, as an image, in case someone asks to see it.
What you have to keep, and for how long, depends on where you live and what the receipts are for. Receipt Cat stores your receipts and makes the report; it doesn't give tax or accounting advice, so check your local rules or ask an accountant.
Scan a receipt
- Tap Scan on Home. The document camera opens. Hold the receipt in front of it, and scan the next one straight after if you have a pile. Each scan becomes its own receipt.
- Or tap Import. Pick From Photos for up to 30 photos at a time, or From Files for a PDF or an image. A photo or PDF can also be shared to Receipt Cat from Mail or Photos.
- Long receipt? Open it, tap the … (More actions) button at the top right, and choose Scan Another Page, Add Page from Photos or Add Page from Files.
- No receipt at all? For a parking meter or a tip, tap Import, then Type It In (No Receipt).
Every receipt is saved the moment you scan or import it, and only then read. If Receipt Cat is closed halfway through a read, it starts that read again the next time you open it.
Check what was read
Receipt Cat reads the merchant, date and total on your iPhone. New receipts wait under To check on Home until you tap Looks right.
Open a receipt and the total is shown large under the receipt image. If anything is wrong, tap the field and fix it: Merchant, Total (with its currency next to it), Date or Category. When it's right, tap Looks right. If no total was found, the button says Add a total first until you type one in.
Under Text on the receipt you can see the words that were read, and tap Read Again. The fields you've changed are kept. And if a receipt has the same total, currency and date as one you already have, Receipt Cat says so, which makes a receipt scanned twice easy to spot.
How to keep receipts organized
- By month. Sorted by date (the default), Home groups your receipts by month, with each month's total next to its name.
- Categories. Meals, Travel, Lodging, Fuel, Office, Software, Groceries, Equipment and Other to start with. In Settings › Categories you can add, rename, reorder or delete them. Once you've set the category for a store, the next receipts read from that store start with the same one.
- Business or personal. Each receipt has a Business / Personal switch, a Reimbursable toggle and, once you've been paid back, Already reimbursed.
- More details. Under More on a receipt: Tax / VAT, payment method, project or client, tags, notes and a warranty.
- Filters. The chips on Home show just the receipts to check, the reimbursable ones not yet paid back, business, personal or one category.
- Search. The search bar on Home looks through merchants, notes, tags, projects and the text read from the receipt itself.
Turn receipts into an expense report
- On Home, tap Report at the top right.
- Pick the dates: this or last month, this or last quarter, this or last year, or Custom.
- Choose what goes in: all, business or personal, reimbursable only, leave out what's been reimbursed, some categories, or one project or client.
- Give it a title, add your name and company, leave Attach receipt images on if you want them in the PDF (turn it off if not), and choose A4 or US Letter paper.
- Tap PDF Report to see it, with Print and Share at the top. Or tap Spreadsheet (CSV) to share a file for your spreadsheet app.
The PDF report has totals by category, a table of every receipt and, if you left it on, the receipt images. Receipts in different currencies keep their own currency, and the report gives a total for each currency rather than adding them together.
Bonus: warranty reminders
Bought something with a warranty? Open its receipt, go to More › Warranty and pick how long it lasts. With notifications on, Receipt Cat reminds you before it ends: 30 days ahead for a warranty of 3 months or more, 7 days ahead for a shorter one. The Warranties chip on Home lists every receipt with a warranty, in the order they end.
Billing clients too?
If you also send invoices for your work, our guide on how to make an invoice on iPhone walks through it.
What it costs
Scanning, reading, keeping your receipts, and the PDF and CSV expense reports are free, with no watermark: the PDF's footer carries only your report's title and the page number. There are no ads, no account and no subscription. Receipt Cat Pro is an optional one-time purchase that adds three things to the report: mileage and per-diem lines, report branding, and one total in a currency you choose, at rates you enter. More on the Receipt Cat page.
Your receipts are read on your iPhone, and kept on it and in your own backups unless you share, save or print them. There's no account, so there's nothing to sign in to.
Quick answers
Do I need a separate scanner?
No. The iPhone's camera does the scanning, and the receipt is read on the phone.
Can I scan a long receipt?
Yes. Open it and add more pages to the same receipt.
Can I save a receipt that came by email?
Yes. Share the PDF or image from Mail to Receipt Cat, or save it to Files and import it.
Is there a watermark on the report?
No. The PDF and the CSV carry no Receipt Cat mark, with or without Pro.
Try Receipt Cat
Try Receipt Cat: free, no watermark, no sign-up → iyio.com/apps/receipt-cat