5 ms·

Is it possible to attach a receipt (say scanned PDFs) to a Ledger entry? I am interested in ledger, would like it to be the accounting system for my side busine

by flatM 11y ago

Is it possible to attach a receipt (say scanned PDFs) to a Ledger entry? I am interested in ledger, would like it to be the accounting system for my side business, a bit more bookkeeping feature such as the receipt attachment would be great for tax filing purpose. Edit: I know that Ledger uses plain text for each entry. Though I kind of wonder how do you guys keep those receipts.

zrail 11y ago
I do this by putting the PDFs in the same git repo as my ledger file, and then adding a filename to the entry as metadata: 2015/11/04 * (12345) Walgreens ; receipt: /receipts/12345.pdf Expenses:Medical:RX $10.00 Liabilities:Credit Card It isn't an attachment, strictly speaking, but you can get at it with scripts and such.
- flatM 11y ago
  That sounds simple and effective. Thanks.
andrewchambers 11y ago
Just a comment with a link to a Dropbox file would work.
zachlatta 11y ago
We use Ledger for all of our accounting (it's not too much... yet) and we've been using comments in Ledger to keep track of our receipts. Example: 2015/02/05 Clipper Card Expenses:Transport:Public Transportation $20 Liabilities:Reimbursement:Zach Latta ; Receipt: 52fae6a40afaf2a79bfdef92f5e1b6d3.pdf Each receipt filename is <md5 hash>.<extension> and they're all tracked in a private GitHub repository. Here's a link to our repo with more examples: https://github.com/hackedu/finances/blob/master/main.ledger https://github.com/hackedu/finances/blob/master/main.ledger
- cgb_ 11y ago
  I do something similar, although I name my receipts/documents with yyyymmdd-friendlyname.pdf for ease of lookup. For my IT consulting business, I also wrote a wrapper that rejects entries that don't have a receipt tag which allows me to catch any entries that I haven't complied 100% with my practices (and tax office won't get upset in an audit). I also autogenerate the ledger entries from the receipt name (and prompt for description/expense account/$$ with logic for handling common items like fuel etc). I've played with PDF metadata so my entire receipt scanning => ledger is automated from just the PDF document but haven't reached a satisfactory setup there.

by flatM 11y ago

zrail 11y ago

I do this by putting the PDFs in the same git repo as my ledger file, and then adding a filename to the entry as metadata: 2015/11/04 * (12345) Walgreens ; receipt: /receipts/12345.pdf Expenses:Medical:RX $10.00 Liabilities:Credit Card It isn't an attachment, strictly speaking, but you can get at it with scripts and such.

flatM 11y ago
That sounds simple and effective. Thanks.

andrewchambers 11y ago

Just a comment with a link to a Dropbox file would work.

zachlatta 11y ago

We use Ledger for all of our accounting (it's not too much... yet) and we've been using comments in Ledger to keep track of our receipts. Example: 2015/02/05 Clipper Card Expenses:Transport:Public Transportation $20 Liabilities:Reimbursement:Zach Latta ; Receipt: 52fae6a40afaf2a79bfdef92f5e1b6d3.pdf Each receipt filename is <md5 hash>.<extension> and they're all tracked in a private GitHub repository. Here's a link to our repo with more examples: https://github.com/hackedu/finances/blob/master/main.ledger https://github.com/hackedu/finances/blob/master/main.ledger

cgb_ 11y ago
I do something similar, although I name my receipts/documents with yyyymmdd-friendlyname.pdf for ease of lookup. For my IT consulting business, I also wrote a wrapper that rejects entries that don't have a receipt tag which allows me to catch any entries that I haven't complied 100% with my practices (and tax office won't get upset in an audit). I also autogenerate the ledger entries from the receipt name (and prompt for description/expense account/$$ with logic for handling common items like fuel etc). I've played with PDF metadata so my entire receipt scanning => ledger is automated from just the PDF document but haven't reached a satisfactory setup there.