Help Center / AI Features

AI Receipt Capture and Categorization

What is this page about: How Light's AI extracts data from a receipt, matches it to the right reimbursement category, and applies the correct GL account and tax code, plus how to upload receipts and fix a miscategorized one.

On this page

  • What Light extracts from a receipt
  • How automatic categorization works
  • Uploading receipts (mobile and web)
  • Fixing a wrong category
  • Getting sharper photos
  • How tax codes get applied
  • Steering the AI with context and instructions

What Light extracts from a receipt

Upload a receipt in the Light app or on the web, and the AI pulls out:

  • Vendor name and domain. Who you paid, plus the merchant's website domain if it's visible on the receipt (used to add a clean logo, see below).
  • Amount and currency. The total gross amount paid, including tax, in the original currency on the receipt.
  • Date and location. When the purchase happened, plus the city and country.
  • Description. An itemized breakdown when the receipt lists individual items, plus a short summary of what the expense was for.
  • Category and tags. A suggested reimbursement category and spending tags based on the receipt content.

If the AI can't confidently read a field, it leaves that field blank rather than guessing. You fill it in.

Good to know: when Light finds the merchant's website domain on a receipt, it adds a clean display name and logo to the expense. This works the same way whether you're spending at home or while traveling.

How automatic categorization works

Light matches each receipt to one of your company's reimbursement categories, set up under Settings → Reimbursement category. The match is based on:

  • The category's Context field, a description your admin writes for what belongs in that category
  • Your own country, user group, and cost center

Light applies the GL account tied to the matched category automatically, and the tax code too, if one is set on that category. If no category is a confident match, Light leaves the category blank and you choose one yourself.

Example: a restaurant receipt matches a "Meals & Dining" category automatically, if your company has one configured.

Uploading a receipt

On mobile

  1. Open the Light app.
  2. Tap the add button, then choose Take photo, Browse photos, or Browse files.
  3. Take or select the receipt image.
  4. Light processes the receipt and extracts the data.
  5. Review the details.
  6. Tap Save.

On the web

  1. Open Light and go to the Expenses page.
  2. Click Upload.
  3. Select an image or PDF from your computer.
  4. The receipt appears in the Draft tab as an editable line item while Light extracts the data.
  5. Review and correct the extracted details directly in the table.
  6. Click Submit for approval. The expense then moves to the Processing tab.

Fixing a wrong category

  1. Check the captured amount, date, and vendor name.
  2. Check the assigned category.
  3. Click the category to change it.
  4. Choose the right one from the list, or search for it. It saves as soon as you select it, there's no separate save step.

Light doesn't retrain itself from individual corrections. Each receipt is parsed on its own, with no memory of past receipts and no vendor-specific rules that build up over time. To make future suggestions more accurate for a category, add guidance to that category's Context field under Settings → Reimbursement category. The AI reads this context every time it parses a receipt.

Getting sharper photos

Blurry or angled photos are the main reason a field comes back blank. For a clean scan:

  • Use good lighting and avoid glare or shadows.
  • Keep the full receipt in frame, top to bottom.
  • Hold the camera steady.

Receipts that are blurry, cropped, or shot at a steep angle may need manual entry instead.

How tax codes get applied

Tax codes live on your company's reimbursement categories, set up under Settings → Reimbursement category. Each category maps to a GL account and, optionally, a tax code. When Light assigns a category to a receipt, it applies that category's tax code to the expense automatically, keeping tax reporting consistent without manual entry.

Steering the AI

Light's AI parses every receipt independently. It has no memory of previous receipts and doesn't build vendor-specific rules over time. You steer it through three inputs instead:

  • Category context, written at Settings → Reimbursement category, describing what belongs in each category.
  • Company AI instructions, custom instructions set at the company level, applied whenever a receipt is scanned.
  • User context, your country, user group, and cost center, considered automatically when matching a category.

Tip: upload a batch of receipts from a trip or a week at once. Light processes each one on its own, so review is a single pass instead of one receipt at a time.

Also searched as: receipt scanning, receipt OCR, AI receipt scanner, automatic expense categorization, GL coding for receipts, tax code on expenses, reimbursement category matching, digitize receipts, receipt to expense.

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