Combine Receipts Into One PDF for an Expense Report

Q: My expense system has a size limit. What if the PDF is too big?

Turn up How much under Compress in PDF Workflow, or use Compress PDF with the exact limit typed in. Black & white scans are already small, so this is rarely needed.

Runs in this tab, on Canvas, pdf-lib, qpdf (WebAssembly) and MozJPEG (WebAssembly), so your file is read from your own device and never sent anywhere. Check it yourself

How to combine receipts into one PDF for an expense report

Lay the receipts out in claim order Sort them by date, or in the order your expense form lists them. Put each on something darker than the paper — a desk, a folder — so its edges stand out.

Scan them in Scan to PDF Press Use your camera and photograph each receipt, or choose photos you already took. Each one is found, straightened and evened out. Tap Adjust to move the corners of a crumpled or curled receipt.

Choose Black & white and save one PDF Thermal receipts are black text on white, and Black & white stores each page as a 1-bit image — a fraction of the size of a color photo, and it can be more legible than the faded original. Press Make the PDF.

Number and compress in PDF Workflow Add the PDF, switch on Number the pages (choose Page 1 of 12 in the top right) and Compress, then press Run the workflow. One file comes out with every job done.

Why numbered pages matter on an expense claim

Whoever approves the claim reads two things side by side: the lines on the form and the receipts behind them. When page numbers are printed on the receipts and the form says “see page 4”, a reviewer can check each line in seconds. When they aren’t, they count pages, lose their place and send the claim back with a question.

PDF Workflow writes the numbers in the page’s own orientation, so a receipt you photographed sideways still gets its number along its visual bottom edge.

What about e-receipts that are already PDFs?

Scan to PDF works from photos. Receipts that arrived by email as PDFs — a hotel folio, a flight invoice — go into the same file with Merge PDF: add the scanned receipts and the e-receipts, drag them into claim order, and save one PDF. Then number and compress the merged file in PDF Workflow, so the numbering runs across all of them.

How are receipts kept readable at a small file size?

Scan to PDF looks for the page’s edges and corners in each photo, corrects the perspective so the receipt is a flat rectangle, and evens out shadows and uneven light. In Black & white each page is then thresholded to pure black and pure white and stored as a 1-bit image, which is why a dozen receipts can come to a few hundred kilobytes.

All of it runs on your phone’s or computer’s own processor with the Canvas API and pdf-lib. The camera feed and the photos never leave the device, which is the point: receipts carry card digits, your name, hotel addresses and the times and places you were.

Three claims this makes easier

A business trip — taxis, meals, a hotel bill and a train ticket, in date order with the hotel folio merged in from email.

A month of small purchases on a company card, scanned on the last day of the month instead of hunted down at quarter end.

A reimbursement for a volunteer or club, where the treasurer wants one tidy file rather than twelve photos in a chat.

Questions

Can I scan several receipts in one photo?

Scan to PDF looks for one page per photo, so photograph receipts one at a time. Small receipts can share a page: put the PDF through Multiple Pages per Sheet afterwards to fit four or six on each sheet.

Should receipts be in color?

Rarely. Black & white is smaller and usually more legible for printed and thermal receipts. Use Grayscale for receipts with stamps or handwriting in pencil, and Color only when a colored stamp is the proof.

My expense system has a size limit. What if the PDF is too big?

Turn up How much under Compress in PDF Workflow, or use Compress PDF with the exact limit typed in. Black & white scans are already small, so this is rarely needed.

Do I need to install an app?

No. Scan to PDF runs in your phone’s browser — Safari or Chrome — and asks for camera permission only while you scan. Nothing is uploaded and there is no account.