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Record your expenses

Upload a receipt, let the AI read the data, check it, then find everything in a summary ready for your trustee.

Accounting10 min read
Table of contents+

The Expenses page brings together the documents your company receives: supplier invoices, VAT and social insurance statements, tax assessments, expense reports and other documents. You upload the receipt, the AI reads the data from it and you check it before saving. You get an up-to-date list, with its receipts, ready to be reconciled with your payments and exported for your trustee.

1. Prepare your company

  1. Open My company, then the General tab.
  2. In the Legal form card, choose the legal form of your company, then click Save fiscal year (that is the label of the button on this card).
  3. If the Accounting menu does not appear, enable the module in My accountModules, then click Save modules.

2. Add a document

  1. Open AccountingExpenses and click Add an expense.
  2. Drag a PDF or an image (PNG, JPEG or WebP, 10 MB at most) into the drop zone, click Browse… or paste a screenshot.
  3. Click Analyse document. The form opens, pre-filled with what the AI read.
  4. Check the document type and the fields (steps 3 and 4), then click Save.

After the analysis, the window title shows the number of analyses used this month, and a Readability badge gives a score out of 100. Below 60, the badge adds a note asking you to verify the data. Below 40, Bill Alps shows Document unreadable: the attempt is not counted, so take a sharper photo or a better scan and use Retry with another document.

3. Choose the document type

The AI suggests a type, which you can change in Document type. The reference field adapts to the type you choose:

  • Supplier invoice: an invoice, till receipt or payment receipt from a supplier. The reference is the Invoice number.
  • VAT return: a statement from the Federal Tax Administration (FTA). Enter the VAT period or reference, for example Q1 2026.
  • Tax assessment: an instalment, a tax bill, an assessment decision or a withholding tax statement. The Tax document type and period or reference field is required, for example Direct-tax instalment 2026.
  • Social insurance statement: a statement or instalment for AVS, LPP, LAA, IJM or family allowances. The Social insurance scheme and period or reference field is required: it must contain a four-digit year and name a single scheme, for example AVS instalment January 2026. The scheme can also be read from the name of the insurance fund. If the document covers several schemes, choose an Account.
  • Expense report: a statement that groups the expenses to be reimbursed to an employee or a partner, not a simple receipt. Enter the person to be reimbursed in Vendor.
  • Shareholder resolution: the minutes of a meeting that decides on a dividend, or withholding tax form 103. Enter the Financial year or dividend date.
  • Financing contract: a loan or leasing contract, a repayment schedule or a due-date notice. Enter the contract number or the due date in Invoice number.
  • Other document: any other document.

4. Check the form

Vendor, Document date and Total incl. VAT are always required, and the total must be greater than 0.

The account

The Account field files the document in the Swiss chart of accounts for SMEs. It feeds the list filter and the table in the Annual balance tab. It is required for a Supplier invoice or an Expense report, and optional for the other types.

Click the field, then type a number or a word, for example 6500 for office and administration costs. All compatible accounts are available as soon as you open the field. The AI may suggest an account: the Classification to review note then shows the account, the confidence level and the reason. In most cases, the suggestion is not copied into the field: if the field is empty, select the account yourself. If you are unsure, ask your trustee.

Split a document across several accounts

When a Supplier invoice or an Expense report covers several items, use the Account allocation section. The AI sometimes pre-fills it when the invoice mixes several purchases.

  1. Click Add row.
  2. Fill in Description, Amount excl. VAT, VAT rate (%), VAT amount and Total incl. VAT.
  3. Choose an Account for the row. If you do not choose one, it takes the account of the document.

For each row, the amount excluding VAT plus the VAT must give the total, and the sum of the rows must equal the totals of the document. Otherwise, Bill Alps displays: Allocations must exactly match the document totals.

The other fields

  • Due date: the payment deadline.
  • Status: To pay by default, or Paid.
  • Currency: CHF only on Starter, all currencies on Team and Business.
  • Amount excl. VAT, VAT rate (%) and VAT amount: optional. If the amount excluding VAT plus the VAT does not match the total, with a tolerance of 5 centimes, a warning is shown but does not prevent you from saving.
  • QR / RF payment reference and Vendor IBAN: they help recognise the payment during bank reconciliation.
  • Acquisition tax: a checkbox shown on a supplier invoice, for an invoice from a foreign supplier subject to art. 45 of the VAT Act. Your trustee will tell you whether it applies to you.
  • Vendor VAT number and Notes: optional.

5. Track your expenses

The list shows the documents of the period chosen at the top of the page, so an expense dated in another fiscal year does not appear there. You can search by vendor or by number, filter with All document types, All accounts and All statuses, and sort by clicking the column headers. The status filter also offers Without receipt.

  • At the end of each row, icons let you open the receipt, edit the expense and delete it.
  • To process several rows at once, tick them, then use Status to switch them to To pay or Paid, or Delete.

With Read access to the module, you can view the list, open the documents and export, but you cannot add or edit an expense. The Annual balance and Drive import tabs require Write access. To set these permissions, see the guide on inviting your team.

6. View the annual balance

Despite its name, the Annual balance tab is not an accounting balance sheet: it is a summary of your expenses over the chosen period.

  • Total expenses, Recoverable VAT and Number of documents cover only documents of the Supplier invoice type. The VAT shown is the sum of the amounts entered, not a check of your right to deduct it.
  • A table breaks these invoices down by account and by quarter, from Q1 to Q4. With the Fiscal year period, Q1 is the first quarter of your fiscal year, not necessarily of the calendar year.
  • If you have several currencies, each one has its own section, with no conversion.
  • Other supporting documents lists all the other types, expense reports included. These amounts are added neither to the total nor to the VAT.

7. Export for your trustee

  • From the list: Export, then Export as CSV or Export as JSON. The export contains the list as displayed, filters included.
  • From Annual balance: Detail export (CSV) gives one row per expense or per allocation row, all types combined. Summary export (CSV) contains the table by account and by quarter.

To process several documents at once, follow the guide on importing your expenses from Google Drive.