Create expenses by forwarding email receipts

ITILITE offers a convenient way to create draft expenses by simply forwarding your email receipts. This feature automatically extracts key details from your receipts, saving you time and effort.

Table of Contents

• How to Create Expenses by Email
• Supported Receipt Formats
• Automatic Expense Details
• Subject Lines and Notes
• Important Considerations
• Verification & FAQs

How to Create Expenses by Email

To create an expense, simply forward the email containing your receipt to auto.expense@itilite.com from your registered email ID.

Once forwarded, ITILITE will automatically process the email and create a draft expense for you. You will receive a confirmation notification, typically within two minutes, indicating that your draft expense is ready for review.

Supported Receipt Formats

ITILITE supports receipts in the following formats:

• PDF files with receipt content
• Image files (JPG, PNG) of receipts

If your email contains multiple supported attachments, a separate draft expense will be created for each attachment. If there are no attachments but the receipt is embedded in the email body (HTML), ITILITE will convert the email body to a PDF and create a single draft expense from it.

Unsupported formats (e.g., .docx, .xlsx, .txt) or non-receipt content will result in an "Invalid attachment - Unable to process file" email, and no expense will be created.

Automatic Expense Details

ITILITE uses AI and OCR (Optical Character Recognition) to automatically categorize and enrich your draft expenses. The system aims to auto-fill relevant expense fields based on the receipt content, including:

• The expense Amount, with currency detection
• The transaction Date
• The Merchant name and location
• A best-guess expense Category

Some fields, such as Project Code or specific client names, may not be available on the receipt and will need to be filled in manually before you submit the expense. Any fields that cannot be reliably extracted will be marked for your attention in the draft.

Subject Lines and Notes

While not mandatory, including a subject line in your forwarded email can be helpful. If you include a subject line, it will be added as a note or comment on the draft expense, where supported by the expense category.

If you leave the subject line blank, ITILITE's AI will still create a relevant comment by understanding the receipt or email content. For expense categories that do not support comments, no subject or note will be added.

Important Considerations

Please keep the following in mind when using this feature:

• Registered Email ID: This feature is available only for registered ITILITE expense users. The system validates the sender's email address against the ITILITE user database. If your email address is not recognized or your account is inactive, the receipt will not be processed, and you will receive an "Email address not recognized" auto-reply.
• Draft Expenses Only: Forwarded receipts always create new draft expenses. This feature does not automatically submit expenses or reports, nor does it attach receipts to existing expenses. You will need to review and submit the draft expense manually.
• Processing Time: Most emails are processed, and draft expenses are created, within approximately two minutes.
• Individual Use: Currently, this feature supports users forwarding receipts for their own expenses from their own registered email. It does not support filing expenses on behalf of others.
• Subject Line Commands: There is no guaranteed support for advanced subject line commands (e.g., to override amounts or target specific reports) in the current version.
• Failed Processing: In cases of poor image quality, corrupted documents, or non-receipt content, OCR extraction may fail. If this happens, you will receive a "Manual review required" or "Receipt processing failed" email, advising you to retake the photo, forward the original email, or create the expense manually.
• Security: Incoming emails are subject to security measures, including virus scanning, spam filtering, and attachment validation, to ensure the integrity of your data.

Verification & FAQs

After forwarding your receipt, you can verify that a draft expense has been created by checking your ITILITE account's expense list or by looking for the confirmation email from ITILITE.