Create charts from expense receipts

To create charts from expense receipts, here’s how you can proceed step-by-step:

Step 1: Extract Data from Receipts

If you have digital or scanned receipts, you’ll first need to extract the data:

• Manual Method: Read and record details into a spreadsheet (date, vendor, category, amount).

• Automated Method: Use OCR (Optical Character Recognition) tools or apps like:

  • Adobe Scan, Microsoft Lens (for mobile scanning)

  • Google Vision API, Tesseract (for coding solutions)

  • Expensify or Receipt Bank (for automated expense tracking)

Step 2: Organize the Data

Create a table or spreadsheet with columns such as:

Step 3: Choose the Chart Type

Depending on what you want to visualize, here are some chart options:

• Pie Chart: Expense distribution by category

• Bar Chart: Total expenses per vendor or category

• Line Graph: Expense trends over time

• Stacked Column: Daily spending segmented by category

Step 4: Create the Charts

Using Excel or Google Sheets:

1. Pie Chart (by Category):

   • Select Category and Sum of Amount.

   • Insert > Chart > Choose Pie Chart.

2. Bar Chart (by Vendor):

   • Select Vendor and Sum of Amount.

   • Insert > Chart > Choose Bar Chart.

3. Line Graph (Spending Over Time):

   • Select Date and Sum of Amount.

   • Insert > Chart > Choose Line Graph.

Using Python (for automation):

Here’s a simple code snippet using pandas and matplotlib:

python
CopyEdit
import pandas as pd
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

# Sample data
data = {
    'Date': ['2025-05-01', '2025-05-01', '2025-05-02'],
    'Vendor': ['Starbucks', 'Uber', 'Office Depot'],
    'Category': ['Food & Drink', 'Transport', 'Office Supply'],
    'Amount': [5.75, 12.00, 43.20]
}

df = pd.DataFrame(data)
df['Date'] = pd.to_datetime(df['Date'])

# Group by Category
category_totals = df.groupby('Category')['Amount'].sum()

# Pie Chart
category_totals.plot.pie(autopct='%1.1f%%', figsize=(6, 6))
plt.title('Expense Distribution by Category')
plt.ylabel('')
plt.show()

Step 5: Export or Display

• In Excel/Google Sheets: Export as image or embed in reports.

• In Python: Use plt.savefig("chart.png") to export the chart.

If you upload some receipts or a spreadsheet, I can help you process and chart them directly.