Snap the receipt.File it to the right job.
Take a photo of a supply-house receipt. AI reads the lines, you say which job each one was for, and every job gets its share of the sales tax. Shop stock goes to General / Overhead.
Home Builders Supply
2x6x12 lumber × 20
Henderson deck$412.00
Joist hangers
Henderson deck$86.40
Instant savings
Henderson deck−$10.00
Drill bit set
General / Overhead$49.99
PVC fittings
Alvarez bath$37.61
Subtotal
$576.00
Sales tax
$40.32
Total
$616.32
Henderson deck
incl. $34.19 tax$522.59
General / Overhead
incl. $3.50 tax$53.49
Alvarez bath
incl. $2.63 tax$40.24
One trip to the supply house, three jobs.
Lumber and hangers for the Henderson deck, PVC fittings for the Alvarez bath, a drill bit set for the shop. One receipt, one total, one line of sales tax at the bottom.
Most apps file the whole receipt to one job, or leave you to type it in three times and work out the tax yourself. So the tax lands on the wrong job, or on none.
If the sales tax isn't in the job cost, the job looks more profitable than it was.
Four steps, about a minute.
Snap the receipt
Open the job and tap Scan receipt. Take up to 5 photos of one receipt, overlapping shots of a long one are fine, or upload a PDF.
Check what AI read
The vendor, date, receipt number, each line, the tax and the total come back for you to check. If the lines don't add up to the subtotal, it says so.
Pick the job for each line
Every line starts on the job you scanned from. Change the ones that were for another job, and put shop stock in General / Overhead.
Save
Each job gets an expense with its lines and its share of the tax. The amounts add up to the receipt's total, to the cent.
Job cost includes the tax.
The tax at the bottom of the receipt is shared out in proportion to each job's taxed lines, to the cent. A discount comes off the item it's for before the tax is placed. A line marked as not taxed gets none.
So each job's cost is what you really paid for its materials, not the shelf price. That's the number to compare against what you charged.
Where the $40.32 of tax went
Henderson deck
$488.40
$34.19
$522.59
General / Overhead
$49.99
$3.50
$53.49
Alvarez bath
$37.61
$2.63
$40.24
Receipt total
$576.00
$40.32
$616.32
Shop purchases have a home.
Drill bits, blades, a box of screws for the truck: not every line is for a job. Put those lines in General / Overhead. It's a project every account has, and it doesn't count against your plan's active projects.
Your overhead is then one place to look, not a pile of receipts filed to whichever job was open.
Or just say it.
In Dash, attach the photos and say what was for what: "lumber and hangers for Henderson, PVC for Alvarez, the drill bits are shop." Bill-The-Job reads the photos and Dash files the lines.
Your own AI works too. Connect Claude, ChatGPT, Grok or Gemini to Bill-The-Job and it can read the photo itself and send the lines. Its reply ends with a line you can check at a glance:
Recorded $616.32 at Home Builders Supply: Henderson deck $522.59, General / Overhead $53.49, Alvarez bath $40.24, tax included.
What's kept, and what isn't.
Kept with the job
Vendor, date and receipt number
Every line, its job and its cost category
Each job's share of the tax, and the total
Who recorded it; anything AI recorded is marked for review
Not kept
The photos. They're read, then discarded.
Keep the paper receipt, or your own photo, if you need the original.
AI reads the receipt and can make mistakes. Check what was recorded.
Filed a line to the wrong job? Move lines on the receipt files it to another job, and the tax is placed again. To fix an amount, delete the receipt and scan it again.
Questions
Yes. Pick the job for each line before you save. Each job gets its own expense with its lines and its share of the sales tax, and together they add up to the receipt's total.
In proportion to each job's taxed lines, to the cent. Discounts come off the item they're for first, and a line marked as not taxed gets no tax.
Yes. Each expense a receipt makes is the job's lines plus its share of the tax, so the job's cost is what you actually paid.
No. The photos are read and then discarded. Bill-The-Job keeps the vendor, date, receipt number, each line, its job and cost category, the tax and the total. Keep the paper receipt or your own photo if you need the original.
General / Overhead, a project every account has for purchases that aren't for a job. It doesn't count against your plan's active projects.
You see everything it read before you save, and it tells you when the lines don't add up to the subtotal or the figures disagree. AI can make mistakes, so check what was recorded. To change a line's job later, use Move lines; to fix an amount, delete the receipt and scan it again.
Yes. Connect your own AI to Bill-The-Job over MCP, on any plan. Send it the photo and tell it which job each line was for; it records the receipt and replies with what it filed to each job. Receipts it reads itself don't count against your plan's monthly receipts.
Each plan includes a number of receipts a month, shown above and on the pricing page. One read covers all the photos of one receipt.