Your first agent task: turn a folder of receipts into an expense sheet

Steps

1. 1Make one folder called receipts and put every receipt in it: phone photos (JPG, PNG, HEIC) and PDFs as they are. Do not rename anything; that is the agent’s job.
2. 2Install one agent. Claude Code needs a Claude Pro or Max plan (or an API key): install it from Anthropic’s Claude Code docs, open a terminal in the receipts folder and run `claude`. Cursor: download the free desktop app, File → Open Folder → receipts, open the chat pane and make sure the mode is Agent, not Ask.
3. 3Paste the prompt below. The agent asks before it reads files or writes anything: approve reading the receipts folder and writing expenses.csv, and refuse anything else (it does not need the internet or other folders).
4. 4Let it work. Claude Code reads photos and PDFs directly; in Cursor the agent usually writes a small script to extract the text and may ask to install a library (say yes or ask for a simpler way). Either way you write no code. Unreadable receipts get the word CHECK instead of a guess.
5. 5Open expenses.csv in Excel, Google Sheets or Numbers. Sort by date, then check every CHECK row against its photo and spot-check five random totals; receipts with a tip, a refund or two currencies are where mistakes happen.
6. 6Ask for extras in plain language: “add a second file with totals per month and per category” or “rename every file to YYYY-MM-DD-merchant-total”. Review the result the same way.
7. 7Keep it for next month: save the prompt as CLAUDE.md in the folder (Claude Code) or as a rule file in .cursor/rules (Cursor), drop in the new receipts and type “do the new ones”. No agent at all? Upload 10 receipts at a time to ChatGPT with the same prompt and copy the table it returns.

Prompt

Replace anything in { } with your details.

You are helping a non-developer. Work ONLY inside this folder.
Task: read every receipt in ./receipts (photos and PDFs) and create ./expenses.csv with these columns:
date (YYYY-MM-DD), merchant, total, currency, category, file
Rules:
- One row per receipt. Use the receipt’s own currency; never convert.
- category is one of: {CATEGORIES, e.g. meals, transport, software, office, travel, other}.
- If you cannot read a value with confidence, write CHECK in that cell instead of guessing.
- Do not install anything or go online unless you ask me first and explain why.
- When done, print: how many receipts you processed, how many rows contain CHECK, and the total per currency.

Expected output

An expenses.csv with one row per receipt (date, merchant, total, currency, category, file), a short count of what was processed and which rows need a manual check, and optionally a monthly and per-category totals file.

Gotchas

• ⚠ Claude Code is not on the free Claude plan; it uses your Pro or Max usage limits, and a batch of photos burns through them faster than text. Do 30 to 50 receipts at a time.
• ⚠ Cursor’s free plan caps agent requests; a big folder may need a paid plan or several sessions.
• ⚠ Blurry or folded receipts produce wrong totals. Re-shoot them flat, in daylight, and run the agent again on just those files.
• ⚠ Receipts show names and card details: keep the folder on your own machine and do not share the chat transcript.
• ⚠ Never let the agent send the sheet anywhere or run commands you do not understand; if it asks to install something, you can say no and ask for a simpler way.