Mastering Accuracy: Doing More Than Just OCR for Receipts
Author: Daniel Vidal, CSO Expensify Date: November 28, 2023
Key Message
OCR alone only processes ~85% of real-world receipts correctly. Receipt scanning apps that rely only on OCR are “destined for failure” because one wrong receipt loses all user trust.
Expensify’s 6-Layer Approach
- Mobile app built around scanning from signup
- World-class OCR — proprietary, trained on millions of receipts, but ceiling at ~85%
- Vast collection of parsers — recognizes frequent vendors (Home Depot, Amazon, Delta) by template
- Human verification network — “secret sauce”: thousands of people 24/7 checking low-confidence scans
- Proprietary matching to bank feeds — matches receipts to card transactions
- AI-based receipt auditing — flags manual changes for corporate compliance
Result
Only company delivering reliable receipt scanning at scale. Forbes, TechRepublic top lists. ChatGPT recognized as top receipt scanning app.
Future
Expanding consumer-focused functionality in “New Expensify” (new.expensify.com).