# Categorize bank transactions

> Free transaction categorizer: upload or paste a bank statement CSV and get every row back with a bookkeeping category set by published rules. No sign-up, nothing stored.

Canonical page: https://superbooks.io/tools/categorize-transactions/

POST https://app.superbooks.io/api/tools/categorize-transactions with the statement as multipart field file (or csv) or a text/csv body. Answers the CSV with Category, Category group and Rule columns; JSON with Accept: application/json. GET lists the rules.

## The rules

Descriptions are lowercased and stripped of punctuation; the first rule whose words appear as whole words sets the category. A row no rule covers is Income for money in and Uncategorized for money out. No model is called.

| Category | Group | Applies to | Description contains |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Credit Card Payment | Banking & Finance | money in or out | credit card payment, card payment thank you, payment thank you, payment received thank you, autopay payment |
| Transfer | Banking & Finance | money in or out | transfer to, transfer from, internal transfer, account transfer, online transfer, savings transfer, tfr |
| Loan Proceeds | Banking & Finance | money in | loan advance, loan disbursement, loan proceeds, loan |
| Loan Principal Repayment | Banking & Finance | money out | loan repayment, loan payment, mortgage, loan |
| Interest Income | Revenue | money in | interest |
| Interest Expense | Banking & Finance | money out | interest |
| Processor Fees | Banking & Finance | money out | processing fee, processing fees, merchant fee, merchant fees, merchant service, card processing |
| Fees | Banking & Finance | money out | bank fee, service charge, service fee, monthly fee, account fee, maintenance fee, overdraft, nsf, wire fee, atm fee, foreign transaction fee, fx fee |
| Payouts | Banking & Finance | money in | payout, payouts, settlement, merchant deposit |
| Chargebacks & Disputes | Revenue | money in or out | chargeback, dispute |
| Customer Refunds | Revenue | money out | refund |
| Other Income | Revenue | money in | refund, cashback |
| VAT/GST/PST/QST Payments | Taxes & Government | money in or out | vat, gst, hst, pst, qst |
| Sales & Use Tax Payments | Taxes & Government | money in or out | sales tax, use tax |
| Payroll Tax Remittances | Taxes & Government | money in or out | payroll tax, source deductions, paye, eftps |
| Income Tax Payments | Taxes & Government | money in or out | estimated tax, income tax, corporation tax, self assessment, 1040es |
| Taxes & Government | Taxes & Government | money in or out | irs, usataxpymt, hmrc, receiver general, franchise tax, tax payment, tax |
| Government Fees | Taxes & Government | money out | business license, business licence, licence fee, license fee, filing fee, registration fee, companies house, secretary of state, dmv, permit |
| Salary | Human Resources | money out | payroll, salary, salaries, wages, gusto, paychex |
| Benefits | Human Resources | money out | benefits, 401k, pension, retirement plan, dental |
| Contractors | Professional Services | money out | contractor, freelancer, upwork, fiverr, deel, toptal |
| Professional Services Fees | Professional Services | money out | accountant, accounting, bookkeeping, bookkeeper, cpa, attorney, lawyer, law firm, legal, solicitor, notary, consulting fee |
| Insurance | Professional Services | money out | insurance, insur, geico, allstate, state farm, hiscox |
| Leases | Liabilities & Debt | money out | lease, leasing |
| Rent | Operations | money out | rent, office rent, landlord, coworking, wework, regus |
| Utilities | Operations | money out | utility, utilities, electric, electricity, hydro, water bill, sewer, natural gas, pg e, con edison, duke energy, enbridge, waste management |
| Internet & Telephone | Operations | money out | internet, broadband, phone, telephone, mobile, wireless, comcast, xfinity, verizon, at t, t mobile, spectrum, rogers, telus, bell canada, vodafone |
| Website | Sales & Marketing | money out | domain, domains, web hosting, hosting, godaddy, namecheap, squarespace, wix, webflow, wordpress |
| Advertising | Sales & Marketing | money out | advertising, google ads, adwords, facebk, facebook ads, meta ads, linkedin ads, microsoft ads, bing ads, tiktok ads |
| Marketing | Sales & Marketing | money out | marketing, mailchimp, constant contact, sendgrid |
| Events | Sales & Marketing | money out | eventbrite, conference, trade show, expo, meetup |
| Promotional Materials | Sales & Marketing | money out | vistaprint, business cards, signage, printing, swag |
| Shipping | Operations | money out | shipping, postage, courier, fedex, ups, usps, dhl, canada post, royal mail, purolator, shippo, easypost |
| Duties & Customs | Cost of Goods Sold | money out | customs, duty, duties, brokerage fee |
| Inventory | Cost of Goods Sold | money out | inventory, wholesale, alibaba |
| Office Supplies | Operations | money out | office supplies, stationery, staples, office depot, officemax |
| Software | Technology | money out | software, saas, adobe, microsoft, google workspace, gsuite, slack, zoom, atlassian, github, notion, dropbox, aws, amazon web services, digitalocean, heroku, vercel, figma, canva, openai, hubspot |
| Equipment | Operations | money out | electronics, best buy, apple store, dell, lenovo, newegg, b h photo |
| Meals | Travel & Entertainment | money out | uber eats, doordash, grubhub, skip the dishes, deliveroo, just eat, restaurant, dining, cafe, coffee, starbucks, tim hortons, mcdonald, mcdonalds, chipotle, pizza, bar, pub, grill, bakery, grocery, groceries |
| Travel | Travel & Entertainment | money out | airline, airlines, air canada, westjet, delta air, united airlines, american airlines, southwest, jetblue, british airways, easyjet, ryanair, lufthansa, expedia, booking com, airbnb, hotel, marriott, hilton, hyatt, accommodation, uber, lyft, taxi, amtrak, via rail, trainline, transit, parking, toll, fuel, gas station, shell, esso, chevron, exxon, petro canada, car rental, hertz, avis, transport, transportation |
| Non-Software Subscriptions | Technology | money out | netflix, spotify, membership, newspaper, magazine |
| Activity | Travel & Entertainment | money out | entertainment, sport, cinema, theatre, theater |
| Training | Human Resources | money out | training, course, tuition, education, udemy, coursera, seminar, workshop |
| Charitable Donations | Owner / Equity | money out | donation, donate, charity, red cross, unicef |
| Owner Draws | Owner / Equity | money out | owner draw, owners draw, owner s draw, dividend |
| Capital Investment | Owner / Equity | money in | capital contribution, owner contribution, owner investment, share capital |

## Questions

### How does it choose a category?

Each description is read against the rules on this page, top to bottom, and the first rule whose words it contains sets the category: "uber eats" is Meals, "uber" on its own is Travel. Some rules depend on the direction of the money, so interest paid in is Interest Income and interest charged is Interest Expense. A row no rule covers is Income when it is money in and Uncategorized when it is money out.

### Which categories does it use?

SuperBooks' own category list: 61 categories in groups such as Revenue, Operations, Travel & Entertainment, Banking & Finance and Taxes & Government. The rules reuse the vocabulary SuperBooks' bank connections translate, so dining and groceries are Meals, fuel and accommodation are Travel, and phone bills are Internet & Telephone.

### Is my statement stored or sent to an AI model?

No. The file is read in memory, each row is categorized by the fixed rules on this page, and the result comes straight back as a download. No model is called and no copy is kept.