Duplicate bills, and vendors that send a bill plus a receipt

Some suppliers send one transaction twice: an invoice, then a payment receipt for the same charge. TALISK_HQ watches for that so the expense is never counted twice.

What TALISK_HQ does on its own

When a new bill arrives (by email scan, upload, or receipt scan), TALISK_HQ compares it to what is already in the book:

• Strong evidence: the copy is filed straight into the Duplicates bucket on Ledger › Expenses. It keeps its document and points at the original, and it can never be approved or reach your books. If it was filed wrongly, open it and use "Not a Duplicate" to return it to review. Strong evidence means the identical file, the same invoice number from the same supplier, or two documents of the same kind whose invoice numbers share a core and whose totals match to the cent (for example GP6120943 and 6120943, both $178.72).
• Weaker evidence: the document stays live in your review queue with a "Possible duplicate" banner, and you decide. This covers the cases where only one thing lines up: invoice numbers that share a core but disagree on the amount, or the same supplier and amount within a few days with nothing else to go on.

A bill and its payment receipt are always left for you, even when every other signal agrees, because burying one of them is the wrong answer. See the section below.

A flagged document wears a Possible duplicate badge on its row in Ledger › Expenses, so you can see which one TALISK_HQ is asking about without opening anything. Click the row to answer.

Answering a "Possible duplicate" banner

Open the flagged document from Ledger › Expenses. The banner names the bill it may duplicate and offers your answers:

• It's the receipt for that bill: shown when one document is a bill and the other is its payment receipt. TALISK_HQ keeps the bill, attaches the receipt to it as proof of payment, and files the receipt against it. This is usually the right answer for a supplier that sends both. See below.
• It's a duplicate: files this copy into the Duplicates bucket. The original stays live and is the one you approve and pay.
• Not a duplicate: clears the flag, and the document proceeds as an ordinary payable.

A flagged bill is never auto-approved, even by a recurring-bill rule: TALISK_HQ waits for your answer first.

A bill and its payment receipt

These are not really duplicates. They are one transaction with two documents, and each one matters for something different: the bill carries what you owe and when, the receipt is your proof that you paid it. Filing the receipt as a plain duplicate keeps the expense from being counted twice, but it leaves the proof of payment in a bucket labelled Duplicates, which is not where anyone looks for it a year later.

It's the receipt for that bill does what a bookkeeper would do instead:

• the bill is kept, whichever of the two TALISK_HQ flagged;
• the receipt's document is copied onto that bill, where it sits alongside the invoice under the bill's own documents;
• the receipt is filed against the bill, so it can never be approved and the expense can never be counted twice.

It records no payment. Attaching the receipt files paperwork; it does not tell your books the bill is settled. Approve the bill and match it to the bank line as usual, and the receipt is right there on it while you do.

When the two documents name different suppliers

A bill and its receipt sometimes carry two names for one company (for example a courier that bills as one company but sends receipts under its brand name). After you confirm such a pair as a duplicate, TALISK_HQ offers to merge the two vendors. Merging teaches the book that the two names are one supplier, so the next bill-plus-receipt pair from them is caught automatically, and bank charges under either name match their bills. You can also merge vendors any time from Ledger › Expenses › Vendors.