Spotting duplicate expenses before they cost you

A duplicate is one of the cheapest mistakes to make and one of the easiest to miss. It rarely looks like a mistake; it looks like a slightly high month.

How they happen

• You photograph a receipt, then type the expense in by hand because you forgot you had.
• Two people on a team capture the same shared dinner.
• You upload the same receipt from your phone and from your laptop.
• A receipt arrives twice, once on paper and once by email.

Two kinds of duplicate

The same receipt twice. The same file, uploaded again. This is the easy one to detect, and Spend flags it as soon as the second copy arrives.

The same purchase, entered twice. Different photos, or a photo and a hand-typed expense, but the same vendor, the same amount on the same date. That pattern is flagged too.

Not every match is a mistake

Two coffees from the same café on the same day, for the same price, are probably two coffees. A flag is a question rather than an accusation. Look at it, decide, and keep both if both are real.

What to do with a real one

Keep the better record, the one with the receipt and the notes, and delete the other. Check that the surviving copy has the tags and category you want.

Make them rare

Pick one way to capture and use it. Capture the receipt, let the expense come from it, and resist the urge to also type it in. One path in means one record out.