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Money out: record business expenses

Record what your business spends in Books → Money out: rent, software, travel and supplier bills with a receipt, a category and the account it was paid from, GST or VAT and input credit when you're registered, unpaid bills, and repeating costs that record themselves.

6 min read · Last updated 2026-10-01

Books → Money out is where you record what the business spends — rent, salaries paid out, software, travel, supplier bills, anything. Each expense takes money out of the account it was paid from, so your bank balances stay true, and it flows into the Profit & Loss and expense reports. It's part of Books.

Not the same as expense claims: HR → Expenses is for employees claiming back money they spent for the company — draft, manager approval, reimbursement (see expense claims). Books → Money out records what the business itself pays. The two are separate lists.

Money out at a glance

Pick a period at the top (This month by default). Four tiles sum it up:

The list shows each expense's Date, No., Vendor (and note), Category, Amount (with “incl. … GST” when it carried tax), Paid from, Method, a paperclip when a receipt is attached, and its Status — Recorded, Unpaid or Void, with a repeat icon for repeating costs. Search by vendor, filter by Category, Paid from account and Status, and Export CSV downloads what's on screen. Click a row to open the expense.

Record an expense

1. Open the form. Click Record expense on Money out, the Overview or the Bank tab (from Bank, the open account is pre-selected as the one it was paid from). On a phone it's in the bar at the bottom of the screen.
2. Amount and date. Enter the Amount paid — the full amount, tax included — and the Date (today by default; future dates aren't allowed).
3. Category and vendor. Choose a Category, or click New category to add one on the spot. Type who you paid under Paid to (vendor); vendors you've used before are suggested.
4. Tax (when you're registered). With Registered for GST on, switch on Includes GST? and enter the tax as a Rate % or an Amount. Pick the Tax type — CGST + SGST or IGST in India; VAT, GST, Sales tax or Other elsewhere — and leave Claim GST input credit on if you can claim it back. A line such as “₹1,000 + ₹180 GST = ₹1,180” confirms the split.
5. Paid now, or a bill to pay later. Leave Already paid on for money that has gone out: pick the Method and Paid from (the account set as default for that method is chosen for you). Turn it off for a bill you owe but haven't paid — it's saved as Unpaid. Add the Reference / bill no. if there is one.
6. Receipt and note. Click Attach photo or PDF to take a photo of the bill or pick a file (up to 10 MB), and add a Note if useful.
7. Save. Click Record ₹…. If the receipt fails to upload the expense is still saved (“the receipt didn't upload. Attach it from the expense.”) and you can attach it afterwards.

Repeating costs

For rent, subscriptions and other regular bills, use Repeats at the bottom of the form: choose How often (Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly or Yearly), an optional Until date, and whether to Record automatically.

• Record automatically on — LogAI records each run for you on its due date, once a day.
• Record automatically off — each run waits under Upcoming at the top of Money out, from a week before it's due, with Record (one tap, same details) and Skip (“Skipped this run”). Runs left more than about three months drop off the list.

Due dates are counted from the first expense's date, so a bill on the 31st stays on month-end. Each run is its own expense in the list.

Categories

Click Categories on Money out to see every category with how many expenses use it. You start with Rent, Salaries, Marketing, Software, Travel, Utilities and Other — rename or delete them, and add your own. Three Built-in categories — Gateway fees, Bank charges and Write-off — are used by Books itself and can't be changed. A category can be deleted only when no expense uses it (“Used by N expenses — move them first”).

Change or undo an expense

Open an expense to see its details, the receipt (Open receipt, Replace receipt, or Attach photo or PDF when there's none), whether input credit was Claimed, and — with Accountant view on — the Accounting entries behind it.

• Wrong note or category? Click Edit note & category and save.
• Wrong amount, date, tax or account? These can't be edited. Click Void, give a reason, and record it again. A voided expense stays on record marked Void and no longer counts.
• Expenses Books created itself — Razorpay gateway fees and expenses created from a bank statement line — show their Source and can't be voided from here.

Paying an unpaid bill: There's no button yet to mark an Unpaid expense as paid. If you've paid it, void the unpaid one and record it again with Already paid on.

Expenses that record themselves

• Razorpay fees — Sync Razorpay on the Bank tab records the fees Razorpay kept from each payout as Gateway fees expenses. See Bank & reconciliation.
• Bank statement lines — when your statement shows money going out that Books doesn't know about, Create → Expense on that line records it and matches it in one step.

Where expenses show up

• The Bank tab, as an Expense line on the account it was paid from.
• Reporting → Books: Profit & Loss, Expenses by Category, Cash by Account — and, with both Books switches on, Input Tax Credit. See Books reports.

Access

Viewing Money out needs View on the Books permission item. Recording expenses, recording an upcoming run and adding categories need Create; editing the note, category or receipt and skipping a run need Update; voiding an expense needs Delete and Update; deleting a category needs Delete. Roles that can only view see “Your role can view Books but not record expenses.” Set these in roles and permissions.

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