Your Sole Trader Tax Return, Built From Your Gmail
The financial year ended 30 June and your receipts are scattered across a year of Gmail. Instead of rebuilding your sole trader tax return from memory, ExpenseBot scans your inbox, pulls out every receipt and tax invoice, separates the GST and categorises each deduction into an ATO-aligned worksheet — a clean Australian expense tracker Google Sheet you own. Lodge it yourself or hand it to your tax agent.
60-day free trial · No credit card · Free for your accountant
EOFY's here — and your receipts are scattered across Gmail
The Australian financial year runs 1 July to 30 June, and most sole traders lodge their individual return by 31 October (later if you use a registered tax agent). The problem is rarely knowing what you can claim — it's finding it. A year of deductible spend arrives as email: the software subscription, the tools invoice, the online supplier, the parking and travel receipts, the phone bill. By October it's buried under thousands of other messages.
The usual response is a late-night scroll through Gmail, a half-finished spreadsheet, and a nagging sense you've missed deductions. There's a faster way: let software read the inbox for you and organise the year into a worksheet. For the full list of what's deductible, see our guide on what you can claim on tax.
Scan your Gmail — a year of receipts, found overnight
Connect your Gmail once and ExpenseBot goes back through your inbox — up to six years — and captures the receipts and tax invoices already sitting there:
- Automatic Gmail capture. It reads receipt and tax-invoice emails, extracts the vendor, date, amount and GST, and writes each to your worksheet. There are no forwarding rules to set up — it finds them where they already are.
- Photos for paper receipts. The parking ticket, the hardware store slip, the café receipt — snap a photo and it's captured the same way.
- Forwarding when you want it. Get a receipt somewhere else? Forward it in and it lands in the same Sheet.
ExpenseBot never sends email on your behalf and never deletes anything — it reads, captures and labels what it has already processed so nothing is counted twice.
Everything lands in a tax worksheet you own
The output is a clean Google Sheet in your Google Drive — not a vendor database you rent access to. Each expense is categorised into business-expense buckets, with GST separated where the receipt shows it, so the worksheet is organised the way a tax return and a BAS need it. You can sort, filter and total it like any spreadsheet, and it stays yours if you ever cancel.
To be clear about scope: ExpenseBot builds the worksheet and a year-end summary. It does not auto-fill an ATO return form or lodge through myTax for you — Schedule C and T2125 form auto-fill exist for the US and Canada, but Australian users get the categorised worksheet and report, which you or your agent use to complete the return. All tax figures are estimates; confirm them with your registered tax agent or the ATO.
See your deductions — and what you nearly missed
Because every captured receipt is categorised, the worksheet shows your deductions grouped the way the ATO thinks about them — so the running total is visible all year, not a shock in October. Common sole trader deductions it helps you keep on top of include:
- Software, subscriptions and online tools
- Phone and internet (business-use portion)
- Home-office running costs
- Motor vehicle and travel expenses
- Stock, materials and supplies
- Bank fees, insurance and professional services
The point isn't just tidiness — every legitimate deduction you capture lowers the income you're taxed on. For the detailed rules on each category, read what can I claim on tax and confirm the specifics with your tax agent.
Track income too — know your net for the return
A sole trader return is built on net business income — what you earned minus what you spent — so the income side matters as much as the deductions. ExpenseBot logs income from Stripe, PayPal, invoices and cash alongside your expenses, so the same worksheet shows your total business income and your net figure for the year.
That's the whole picture in one place — the same idea behind our income and expense tracker, tuned for an Australian sole trader at tax time.
Sole trader tax-return prep in four steps
- Connect Gmail. One secure Google sign-in — no forwarding rules, no data leaves your own Drive.
- Scan the year. ExpenseBot reads the financial year (or several) and captures every receipt and tax invoice it finds.
- Review the worksheet. Check the categorised deductions and GST, add any paper receipts by photo, log your income.
- Send it to your agent — or lodge it yourself. Share the Google Sheet; your registered tax agent works from clean data and uses ExpenseBot free.
Doing it by hand vs. ExpenseBot
| By hand | ExpenseBot | |
|---|---|---|
| Finding a year of receipts | Scrolling Gmail in October | Scanned automatically, up to 6 years |
| GST | Worked out row by row | Separated as each receipt is captured |
| Categorising deductions | You label every expense | Sorted into ATO-aligned buckets |
| Income | Added up separately | Stripe / PayPal / invoices / cash, in the same Sheet |
| Where it lives | Scattered files | One Google Sheet in your own Drive |
Feature availability depends on which emails and accounts you connect. Tax figures are estimates — confirm with your registered tax agent or the ATO.
Build your sole trader tax worksheet
Connect Gmail and let ExpenseBot pull a year of receipts into a categorised, GST-separated Google Sheet you own — ready for your return or your tax agent. Free for accountants and registered tax agents.
Start free — no credit card, 60-day trialFrequently asked questions
Can ExpenseBot do my whole sole trader tax return?
It builds your tax worksheet — every deductible expense found in your Gmail, categorised, with GST separated out, in a Google Sheet you own. You (or your registered tax agent) use that worksheet to complete the return. It does not lodge with the ATO for you, and the figures are estimates you should confirm with your tax agent.
How far back can it find my receipts?
It scans your Gmail history (up to six years), so you can pull together the whole financial year — or catch up on past ones — without digging through your inbox. It reads the receipt and tax-invoice emails you already have; there are no forwarding rules to set up.
What about GST?
Where a receipt or tax invoice shows GST, ExpenseBot captures it with the GST separated, so your worksheet is closer to BAS- and return-ready. It is a record-keeping tool, not a BAS lodgement service — always confirm the GST treatment of each expense with your tax agent.
I lost some paper receipts — can I still claim?
If the receipt or tax invoice is sitting in your email, ExpenseBot finds it. For genuinely missing ones, follow the ATO's substantiation rules for what you can claim without a receipt, and check the specifics with your tax agent.
Does it track my income too, not just expenses?
Yes. Alongside deductible expenses it can log income from Stripe, PayPal, invoices and cash, so your worksheet shows net business income for the year — the figure your return is built on.
Where does my data live — is it safe?
In a Google Sheet inside your own Google Drive. ExpenseBot writes to a spreadsheet you own; cancel any time and the data stays with you. You can share it with your tax agent, who uses ExpenseBot free.