Importing statements

When to import#

A bank you've connected sends its transactions on its own, to the account's Bank Feed card (see Connecting a bank). Import a statement when an account isn't connected, when you're catching up on months from before you connected it, or when you're moving from another app.

Either way, nothing goes into your books until you've looked it over: every import waits for your review first (see Reviewing and approving).

Get the file from your bank#

On your bank's or card's website, find the account's activity or statements and download it as a CSV (sometimes called "spreadsheet", "Excel" or "comma separated"). Any stretch works: a month, a quarter or the whole year.

• Files up to 10 MB and 5,000 lines. For more, download a quarter at a time.
• Only have a PDF? Hand it to your assistant instead (below).

Upload it#

Accounts/Business Card

Business Card

Credit account ···4417

EditImport a Statement

Balance Owed

$1,204.16

Statement closing balance, Aug 31, 2026

Paid in 2026

$21,486.30

Expenses

284

Recorded as paid with Business Card

Statements

8 of 10

2 months to bring in

Statements in 2026

Every month's statement, newest first.

2026

October 2026MissingImport

September 2026MissingImport

August 2026 · Aug 1 – Aug 3136 expenses, 1 card payment · closing $1,204.16Reconciled

Step 1 of 6PauseStart over

1. 1Open the account on Accounts and click Import a Statement. (Import beside a missing month does the same.)
2. 2Which account is it from? starts at this one. Drop the CSV from your bank on the box, or click it to choose the file.
3. 3It's read at once: how many lines, the dates they cover, the charges, and what the rest are: here a refund and a card payment.
4. 4How the file was read shows the columns it used. Change anything that looks wrong: the account remembers it for next time.
5. 5The first lines show how they'll come in: tidied vendor names, and the card payment, which isn't spending.
6. 6Click Review 42 Lines. The statement opens for review; nothing is in your books until you approve it.

1. Open the account on Accounts and click Import a Statement. On the account's Statements card, each month without one says Missing, with Import beside it. You can also start from Import Statement on Expenses.
2. Upload a Statement opens. Check Which account is it from?, or pick New account… and give it an Account name (like Amex Platinum or Business Checking) to make one as you go.
3. Drop the CSV on the box, or click it to choose the file. EscBooks reads it straight away and shows how many lines it found, the dates they cover, the charges and their total, and what the rest are: refunds and card payments on a card, deposits and transfers on a bank account.
4. Glance at How the file was read and The first lines, as they'll come in. If you picked the wrong file, Another File goes back.
5. Click Review (it says how many lines, like Review 42 Lines). The statement opens for review. Nothing is in your books yet.

Along the way, the dialog checks the file against the account:

• If the file names a different card or account (by its last four digits), or looks like the other kind (a bank account's file for a card, say), it says This file looks like it's from…. Pick the account it's from, or tick It's [the account]; import it here anyway. Review waits until you do.
• Started from Expenses, it switches to the account whose last four digits the file names.
• If the account has no last four digits yet and the file names one, it's saved on the account, and the dialog says so.
• A line with no date or amount it can read is left out, and a note under the lines says which. Check the columns if you see it.

How EscBooks reads the file#

Every bank exports differently, so EscBooks works it out from the file itself:

• Columns. It finds the date, description and amount, even under a few lines of account summary, or with no header row at all. Commas, semicolons and tabs all work as separators. When a file has both a transaction date and a posted date, it uses the transaction date: the day you bought it.
• Amounts. A charge can be positive, negative, or in its own column beside a column of credits; amounts like "$1,234.56", "(12.34)", "12.34-" and "1.234,56" all read. In a single amount column, the card payment's sign is how it tells which way the file is written.
• Dates. 03/14/2026, 14/03/2026, 2026-03-14, "Mar 14, 2026" and "14 Mar 2026" all read. It picks the order that reads every date in the file.
• Vendors and categories. Merchant text like "SQ *BLUE BOTTLE 0093" is tidied into a vendor name, matched to your own vendors and subscriptions, and given a category. A bank's own category column, when the file has one, helps pick it.
• Card payments, refunds, transfers and deposits. On a card, a credit worded like a payment ("PAYMENT THANK YOU", "AUTOPAY") is a Card payment: the card being paid, so it isn't counted as spending. Any other credit is a Refund, matched on the review page to the purchase it refunds. A charge worded like a payment (a phone bill on autopay, say) is still a charge. On a bank account, money out worded like a payment or transfer is a Transfer or payment for the review to sort out, and money in is a Deposit, which the review matches to your client payments.

Anything it got wrong, change under How the file was read: Date, Description, Amount (or Two columns: charges and credits, then the Charges column and Credits column), Dates are written, and Charges in this file are Positive or Negative. The account remembers your choices, so next month's file reads the same way: it then says Read with this account's columns from last time.

Try it on a small file. The reading is EscBooks' own, so this is what the dialog would show:

Transaction Date,Post Date,Description,Amount
09/02/2026,09/03/2026,SQ *BLUE BOTTLE 0093,-18.50
09/03/2026,09/03/2026,PAYMENT THANK YOU,1204.16
09/05/2026,09/06/2026,JUNIPER PRINT CO 0021,-212.40
09/15/2026,09/16/2026,UBER *TRIP HELP.UBER.COM,-24.60

Or hand it to your assistant#

Accounts/Business Card

Business Card

Credit account ···4417

EditImport a Statement

Balance Owed

$1,204.16

Statement closing balance, Aug 31, 2026

Paid in 2026

$21,486.30

Expenses

284

Recorded as paid with Business Card

Statements

8 of 10

2 months to bring in

Statements in 2026

Every month's statement, newest first.

2026

October 2026MissingImport

September 2026MissingImport

August 2026 · Aug 1 – Aug 3136 expenses, 1 card payment · closing $1,204.16Reconciled

Upload a Statement

The CSV download from your card or bank. EscBooks reads it, tidies it up, and shows you every line before anything is added.

Which account is it from?

Business Card ···4417

Drop the CSV here, or choose a fileAny month, or the whole year. Up to 10 MB.

Only have a PDF? Hand it to your assistant instead.

Step 1 of 5PauseStart over

1. 1A PDF, or rather not upload it yourself? In Upload a Statement, click Only have a PDF? Hand it to your assistant instead.
2. 2Import with Your Assistant has the words to say, ready to copy. Copy the first one.
3. 3In your assistant's chat, attach the statement and paste the words.
4. 4It looks up your categories, accounts, vendors and rules, then sends every line to EscBooks for your review.
5. 5It waits on Expenses (and you get an email). Click Review → to go through it, the same review as an upload.

With an assistant connected (see Connected assistants), attach the statement in your chat, CSV or PDF, and ask. In Upload a Statement, Only have a PDF? Hand it to your assistant instead. opens Import with Your Assistant, with the words to say ready to copy:

Import my September Amex Platinum statement into EscBooks.

What the assistant does:

• It first looks up your categories, your cards and accounts, your subscriptions, the vendor names you already use, and your import rules, so a cryptic merchant line becomes the vendor you already have.
• It sends every line, never dropping one: cleaned-up vendor names and categories, subscriptions linked, card payments set aside and anything that looks personal marked. EscBooks then applies your import rules and flags what's already recorded, as it does for an upload.
• If the statement prints its opening and closing balances, it sends those too, so the review can check them.
• The lines wait for your review. You get an email with a link, the statement shows on Expenses (… your assistant prepared, waiting for your review, with Review →) and on the account, and the review page says Prepared by and your assistant's name.
• If it didn't say which account the statement is from, the review page asks Which account is this statement from?: pick it and Use This Account.

Your statement goes to your own assistant, not to EscBooks. Only the lines you approve become expenses.

It can also check what's there without changing anything:

Here's my year-end Amex Platinum statement. Check that every business charge is in EscBooks, and tell me what's missing.

Which card and bank statements am I missing in EscBooks this year?

A check reports what's recorded, what's missing, charges whose amount differs, and expenses recorded on that account that aren't on the statement. It can also check the statements already in EscBooks, with no file at all.

The assistant needs Add expenses turned on in Connected Assistants to bring lines in; to check a statement, it only needs to see your books. If it can't add expenses yet, Import with Your Assistant says so.

Your statement files#

Each CSV you upload is kept with its account. On the account, the spreadsheet icon beside a statement downloads the original, the same file your bank gave you; on the review page, its file name does the same. Your accountant can download them too. Discard an import, and its file goes with it.