Expenses — User Guide

Who can use Expenses

Enable the Expenses module from Marketplace (free) — no other modules are required first. Your role must include the relevant permissions (view, create, update, delete, restore, force.delete, assign, submit, approve, reject, pay, cancel as needed).

Without assign, you only see expenses assigned to you.

List & table

Open Expenses from the sidebar, under the Purchasing group (after Purchase Orders). Search by title or number, filter by status or category, toggle My Expenses, and switch KPI cards (Total, Mine, Draft, Submitted, Approved, Paid) to quick-filter the table. The table shows category (or Mixed when lines use more than one), status, amount, expense date, assignee, and the latest note. A category filter includes expenses that use that category on any line.

Use Manage categories (visible with expenses.create, expenses.update, or expenses.delete) to add, rename, activate/deactivate, or delete workspace expense categories. New workspaces start with Travel, Office, Software, Utilities, and Other. You cannot delete Other (it is the default when a header-only expense is created without a category). You also cannot delete a category that still has expenses. Renaming a starter category keeps its slug.

• Users with restore can filter Active / Include deleted / Deleted only, then Restore a soft-deleted expense from the row menu
• Delete permanently requires expenses.force.delete — granted to the workspace owner by default

Create an expense

1. Click New expense
2. Enter a title and at least one line: description, amount, optional tax, and a category from your workspace list. Add more lines when one receipt covers several categories. The expense total is the sum of the lines.
3. Optionally set currency and an expense date
4. If Vendors or Purchase Orders are installed on your workspace, optionally link a vendor and/or a purchase order — use New beside the vendor picker to create and select a vendor inline when you have vendors.create
5. Optionally attach a receipt file — allowed types and max sizes follow Settings → Storage → Upload limits (counts toward your workspace Storage quota)
6. Optionally set an assignee (requires assign)
7. Save

Edit from the row menu or the record page while the expense is still Draft. After Submit, content is locked; use status actions and assignment instead. You can add a receipt while editing a draft expense.

Receipts

On the expense record page, the Receipts section lists uploaded files with a Download action. Receipts are stored privately in your workspace Storage quota (not public URLs). Upload failures due to quota or missing Storage entitlement show inline errors on the form.

Status workflow

An expense starts in Draft. Move it forward with:

• Submit (draft → submitted) — sends the expense for approval
• Approve (submitted → approved) — requires expenses.approve, not limited to the assignee
• Reject (submitted → rejected) — requires expenses.reject; terminal
• Mark as paid (approved → paid) — requires expenses.pay. When Accounting is installed, you must choose Paid from (cash/bank account); optionally pick an expense P&L account (defaults to Operating Expenses). Accounting posts Dr expense / Cr paid-from for amount + tax so that bank's balance decreases
• Undo payment (paid → approved) — requires expenses.pay. The expense can be marked paid again. When Accounting is installed, the payment journal is voided. A locked fiscal period blocks the undo and leaves the expense paid
• Cancel (draft → cancelled or submitted → cancelled) — terminal

Invalid transitions (e.g. paying directly from Draft) are rejected with a validation error. Rejected and Cancelled are terminal. Paid can return to Approved.

Optional vendor / purchase order links

Both links are soft — they only appear in the create/edit form when the corresponding module (Vendors / Purchase Orders) is installed on your workspace, and they're always optional even when installed. An expense created without either link works exactly the same as one that has them; they're purely for cross-referencing spend to a supplier or an order.

Assignment

Users with assign can set or clear the assignee from the record page or the create/edit form. The assignee receives an in-app notification when someone else assigns them.

Notes & timeline

• Notes — free-form notes on the expense
• Timeline — history of create, update, assignment, status change, note, and delete/restore events

Ask EloSync

With the AI Assistant module installed, Ask EloSync can list expenses awaiting approval, fetch an expense by UUID, and propose status changes, assignments, or notes. Nothing is saved until you confirm the suggestion. Approving needs approve; rejecting needs reject; marking paid or undoing a payment needs pay. When Accounting is installed, set a paid-from account on the expense before confirming a paid status suggestion (same as changing status without the dedicated Mark as paid dialog). Confirming a return from paid to approved voids the payment journal. See AI Assistant.

What's not here yet

Reimbursement/payout tracking beyond the paid status is planned but not part of this module yet — see the Product Roadmap. Itemized lines are available: each line has its own description, amount, tax, and category. Paying still posts one journal for the expense total.

Accounting (shipped): when Accounting is installed, Mark as paid posts a journal — see Accounting.