Expense records matter as much as invoicing. Every deductible expense lowers your tax base and therefore your income tax, and for a VAT payer it also opens the input VAT deduction. Taxorio offers two ways to record an expense — enter it by hand, or let the AI read the document for you. This guide covers both in detail.
Entering an expense by hand, step by step
Step 1: Open the form
In the main menu choose Expenses and then the New expense button in the top right corner. The form for a new expense opens.
Step 2: Supplier details
Fill in who you bought the goods or services from:
- Supplier name — an autocomplete field. If you have recorded an expense from the same supplier before, start typing and Taxorio offers it.
- Company ID (IČO) — the eight-digit Czech business identification number
- Tax ID (DIČ) — the VAT identification number, which matters for the VAT deduction and the VAT control statement
Step 3: Identify the document
Every expense has to be backed by a document. Fill in:
- Document number — the invoice or receipt number from the supplier
- Issue date — the date the document was issued
- DUZP (date of taxable supply) — the date the service was delivered or the goods handed over. The field is optional and only needs filling when it differs from the issue date; for a VAT payer this date decides which tax period the document belongs to.
Step 4: Description
In the Description field write a short but specific note — for example "Annual JetBrains IntelliJ IDEA licence" or "Mobile tariff 02/2026". A good description helps when you search later and when a tax inspection asks what the expense was for.
Step 5: VAT rate
Pick the VAT rate that matches what you bought. Taxorio has quick buttons for the rates in force:
- 21 % — the standard rate (most goods and services)
- 12 % — the reduced rate (food, books, some services)
- 0 % — exempt supply, or a purchase from a non-payer
You can also type a different rate if you are buying from abroad at a foreign rate.
Step 6: The "incl. VAT" / "excl. VAT" switch
Some documents state the amount including VAT, others without it, so Taxorio lets you choose which number you are typing:
- With incl. VAT selected you enter the total and Taxorio derives the base and the VAT
- With excl. VAT selected you enter the tax base and Taxorio derives the VAT and the total
The calculation runs as you type — enter one amount and all three values appear at once.
Step 7: The amount fields
The form shows three linked amounts:
- Tax base (excl. VAT)
- VAT — calculated automatically from the rate you chose
- Total incl. VAT
Below them Taxorio draws an amount breakdown bar showing the ratio of base to VAT, so you can see at a glance how much of the price is tax. If the VAT does not match the base at the selected rate, a warning appears — that usually means a receipt with several rates entered as a single-rate document.
Step 8: Business-use percentage
Not every expense relates purely to business. A phone or a laptop you also use privately is the classic case, so Taxorio lets you set the share used for business.
Quick buttons offer 100 %, 80 %, 50 % and 30 %, and you can type your own percentage.
Set anything below 100 % and the form shows the deductible amount together with the private share. An expense of CZK 10,000 including VAT at 80 % business use gives a deductible expense of CZK 8,000, with 20 % private. That is the amount used in the tax return.
Step 9: Category
Choose the category that fits the expense. Taxorio groups them so the list stays navigable:
- IT & technology — software and licences, hardware and equipment
- Operations — office supplies, rent, phone and internet
- Travel & transport — travel, fuel, vehicle costs
- Professional services — services, legal, accounting, insurance
- Business — marketing and advertising
- Trade & materials — materials, tools and equipment
- Education — courses and training
- Non-deductible expenses — entertainment and gifts, and your own social, health and income tax payments, which are not tax expenses
- Other — anything that fits nowhere else
Categories do more than tidy the list: the non-deductible group is excluded from the deductible total, so a category picked carelessly changes the number you file.
Step 10: Attach the document
You can attach a scan or a photo to every expense. Taxorio accepts PDF, photos (JPG, PNG, HEIC, WEBP), ISDOC files and common office formats, up to 50 MB per file.
Attaching is optional but strongly recommended. In a tax inspection you have to be able to produce a document for every recorded expense, and having it in the system means not digging through folders.
AI document recognition: the document inbox
Entering by hand is reliable but slow once the documents pile up. The document inbox reads them for you.
Step 1: Get the document in
Open Document inbox and drag the files — or a whole folder — anywhere onto the page, or pick them with the file selector. You can also scan a receipt with your phone: Taxorio opens a scanning session from a QR code, so the photo lands straight in the inbox.
Step 2: Recognition
Taxorio reads each document and extracts:
- Supplier name and IČO
- Document number
- Issue date and DUZP
- Amounts (base, VAT, total)
- VAT rate
- Expense category
Step 3: How confident the recognition is
Each processed document carries a recognition confidence in percent. Documents at 80 % or more are grouped as ready to confirm; anything below that waits in the review queue for you to look at. The percentage is shown next to the document, so you can see immediately where your attention is needed.
Step 4: Check and confirm
Open a document and a panel appears with the original — PDF or image — on one side and the extracted fields on the other. Compare them, correct anything read wrongly, and confirm. The expense is then stored with all its data and the original document attached.
Step 5: Duplicate detection
When a document carries the same document number as an expense already recorded from the same supplier, Taxorio flags it before you confirm. That is what stops the same invoice from being recorded twice.
Step 6: Confirming a batch
With several documents waiting, use Confirm all ready — it processes everything in the ready group in one go. Documents that need a human decision are deliberately held back in the Needs review group and listed with the reason: recognition confidence below 80 %, a missing supplier, amount, issue date or VAT rate, a proforma invoice, the abolished 15 % VAT rate, a foreign supplier who charged Czech VAT, a reverse-charge document that does not add up (no supply code or supplier country, VAT shown on the document, a regime your VAT status does not allow), or a credit note whose original document is missing. You confirm those one by one.
Why the records matter for tax
Income tax
Every correctly recorded expense lowers your tax base. At the 15 % personal income tax rate, an expense of CZK 10,000 saves CZK 1,500 in tax. Above a tax base of CZK 1,762,812 (2026), where the second rate of 23 % applies, the saving is higher still.
VAT deduction
A VAT payer can deduct input tax on purchases related to the business. Buy software for CZK 12,100 including VAT (base CZK 10,000 plus VAT CZK 2,100) and the CZK 2,100 is deductible against the VAT you collect on your own invoices.
For the deduction to hold, the expense has to meet the conditions:
- It relates to your economic activity
- You hold a valid tax document showing the supplier's DIČ
- It is recorded in the correct tax period (by DUZP)
Flat-rate expenses versus real expenses
If you apply the flat-rate expense deduction — a percentage of income — recording real expenses is not required for income tax. But a VAT payer has to record them anyway for the VAT deduction, whichever expense method applies.
Tip: record expenses even under the flat-rate deduction. At the end of the year you then know your real total and can see whether the other method would have come out better. The expense method is a setting in Taxorio: the app calculates only the regime you have selected and does not show both variants side by side, so compare them yourself before switching.
Practical tips
Record as you go
Do not collect paper until the end of the month or the year. Record each expense when the document arrives — from the inbox it is a short review and a click.
Photograph receipts straight away
Thermal receipts fade and become unreadable. Photograph them on the spot and upload them; the digital copy is your backup if the original is lost or illegible.
Check the category
Recognition assigns a category automatically and it can get it wrong. A quick check keeps your spending overview accurate and keeps non-deductible items out of the deductible total.
Do not forget the business-use share
Where an expense also serves private life — phone, car, internet — always set the matching percentage. In a tax inspection you have to be able to justify the share you claimed.
Expense records in Taxorio are built to be quick and precise. Hand entry and AI recognition together cover every situation, from a single receipt to dozens of documents processed at once.
Taxorio scope: Taxorio provides invoicing and income/expense records for Czech sole traders. It is not full accounting or personalised tax advice. For an unsupported or unusual case, verify the treatment with a Czech accountant or tax adviser before filing.