Expense Tracking for Retail

Stop chasing paper receipts and cluttered inboxes. Your staff send a photo of any receipt to a Telegram or WhatsApp bot. The system reads the amount, category, and vendor, logs it, and sends finance a daily summary. Setup runs from S$5,000 to S$15,000, built for retail in Singapore.

What it costs

Automation setup fee: S$5,000 to S$15,000
Monthly retainer: S$200 to S$500 per month

What it replaces

Expense Tracking replaces emailing receipts or filing physical ones.
For scale, front desk receptionist salary runs S$2,400 to S$2,800 per month.

Which Singapore rules apply

PDPA enforcement in practice. Recent PDPC fines on smaller companies run S$3,000 to S$17,500. The 10% of turnover penalty cap applies only above S$10M turnover. The Data Protection Essentials programme subsidises a setup plus one-year retainer offer.
Do Not Call rules for WhatsApp marketing. The Do Not Call registry covers WhatsApp marketing to Singapore numbers. Consent is required before sending marketing messages on push channels.
GST InvoiceNow timeline. The GST InvoiceNow requirement applies only to GST-registered businesses, phased in waves from April 2028 to April 2031. Free InvoiceNow-ready solutions run until March 2031, with a transitional grant of up to S$1,000.

Why retail need this

Customer enquiries across several channels
Asking customers for reviews
Tracking expenses

How it works

Runs on n8n, Telegram bot, Claude API, Google Sheets, Xero.
Staff send a photo of a receipt to a Telegram or WhatsApp bot. The system reads the amount, category, and vendor, logs it, and sends finance a daily summary.

Questions Singapore owners ask

Can I use a government grant to pay for this?

Usually not, and we will tell you straight. Most custom automation work is not grant subsidised. The Productivity Solutions Grant (PSG) only funds pre-approved packaged solutions, and a custom build like this is not one of them. The Enterprise Development Grant (EDG) can fit larger qualifying projects, but only with EnterpriseSG approval, and it rarely fits work at this size. From the second half of 2026 these schemes consolidate into a single EDGE grant. If a project does qualify, we will say so and help you apply. If it does not, we will not pretend otherwise.

Will I pay GST on the project?

It depends on the vendor. A vendor that is not GST-registered adds no GST. A GST-registered vendor adds 9%; a GST-registered client claims that back from IRAS, while a non-registered client absorbs it.

How is pricing structured?

A one-time setup fee plus a monthly retainer. The retainer covers ongoing data pulls, template tweaks, and new conditions as the business changes.