It’s tax season and, for many musicians, that means a nightmare of trawling through piles of receipts to sort out expenses.
To help you with your admin, I’ve had a look at the two most popular receipt apps that you can use to streamline your taxes. Imagine taking a photo of your receipt and watching the app extract the data to a spreadsheet that you can send to your accountant!
Read on to find out how you can spend less time on admin and more time making music.
1. 1Tap Receipts
1Tap Receipts gets my vote as the best up-and-coming receipt app out there (in fact, it looks so good that I’ve started using it myself). Its smart scanning technology is incredible and it’s designed to work for musicians in the British tax system.
Features
- Automatic data extraction from photos of receipts (I was very impressed by how well it handled an almost illegibly scrawled receipt from my bowmaker) – no need to type anything in
- Receipt splitting (e.g. a group meal or a receipt for which you have both personal and business expenses)
- Yearly expense tracker
- Currency conversion
- Processes email receipts from online purchases
- Spreadsheet export
- Designed specifically for self-employed freelancers in the UK
- Free to download and use, with 10 free scans/month and unlimited manual receipt entry
- Paid version (currently discounted to £3.75/month) allows unlimited scanning of receipts
- Available on iPhone and Google
“With 1Tap, my receipts are filed and out of my head before I’ve left the shop.” – Helen Leek, piano teacher at the Royal College of Music Junior Department
2. iXpenseIt
iXpenseIt comes highly recommended by some of my musician colleagues, who love its easy-to-use design. iXpenseIt simplifies daily expense tracking and monthly budgeting by allowing you to record expenses anywhere.
Features
- Simple budget
- Recurring expenses
- Running total of yearly income and expenses
- Currency conversion
- Mileage tracker
- Data export (can be viewed from any web browser)
- £3.99 to download, with a premium version available
- Available on iPhone
“Using iXpenseIt to scan receipts on the move is my saving grace!” -Richard Waters, violist in the Philharmonia Orchestra
In my opinion, 1Tap Receipts is great for UK-based musicians while iXpenseIt may be more suitable for non-UK musicians. Bottom line? If you’re a self-employed musician, your life will be so much easier with a receipt scanner app so download one of these today!
Do you use a different tax app? Email Paula at [email protected].
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