Expense tracking is not really about knowing what you spent. It is about being able to prove it, twelve or eighteen months later, in a form your accountant or HMRC will accept. Most small businesses lose money here quietly — not through anything dramatic, just through receipts that faded in a van, journeys nobody wrote down, and costs that never made it onto the return.
Capturing Receipts Before They Disappear
A thermal receipt is illegible within a year, and HMRC expects you to keep records for at least five years after the Self Assessment deadline for that tax year. A photograph taken at the till solves both problems at once.
BillMate captures receipts from your phone at the moment of purchase, attaches them to a categorised expense, and stores them against the right business. The paper copy stops mattering.
Categories That Match How You Are Taxed
Categorising as you go rather than in a panic each January is the difference between claiming everything you are entitled to and claiming what you can remember. Common categories for a small UK business include materials and stock, tools and equipment, vehicle running costs, fuel, insurance, subscriptions, professional fees and use of home.
What is actually allowable depends on your trade and how you operate, and the rules differ between sole traders and limited companies. Your accountant is the right person to confirm what applies to you — BillMate's job is making sure the record exists and is categorised when they ask.
Mileage
Business mileage is one of the most commonly under-claimed expenses, because journeys are easy to make and easy to forget. HMRC publishes approved mileage rates for using your own vehicle for business, and the current rates are on GOV.UK. Recording the journey at the time, with the date, route and reason, is what makes the claim defensible.
Digital Records and Making Tax Digital
Making Tax Digital for Income Tax now applies to sole traders and landlords with qualifying income above £50,000, dropping to £30,000 from April 2027. Where it applies, expense records must be kept digitally and submitted quarterly rather than compiled once a year.
Capturing expenses in BillMate as you go means those records are already digital, dated, categorised and exportable — which is the part of MTD that catches people out. For the quarterly submissions themselves, check the recognised software list on GOV.UK.
