Restaurant receipt: fields & CSV layout
Restaurant receipts are the messiest expense category: faded thermal paper, handwritten tips, and a subtotal-plus-tip total. Here are the fields to capture and the CSV layout that keeps meal expenses clean.
Convert a receipt free →Fields extracted
| Field | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|
| merchant | string | Restaurant name. |
| date | date (ISO) | Date of the meal, normalized to YYYY-MM-DD. |
| subtotal | number | Food/drink subtotal before tip and tax. |
| tax | number | Sales tax / VAT. |
| tip | number | Gratuity — often handwritten, captured when legible. |
| total | number | Final total including tip. |
Clean CSV layout
| merchant | date | subtotal | tax | tip | total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Corner Bistro | 2026-03-11 | 64.00 | 5.60 | 13.00 | 82.60 |
| Sakura Ramen | 2026-03-15 | 31.50 | 2.76 | 6.00 | 40.26 |
Sample rows are illustrative. ParseDoc outputs this exact column layout from your own document.
Conversion notes
›Handwritten tips and totals get a lower confidence score — flag those for a quick human check rather than trusting silently.
›Keep tip separate: many meal-expense policies cap or exclude gratuity, and some tax rules treat it differently.
›Phone photos work; a flat, well-lit shot of the final (tipped) copy beats the merchant copy.
FAQ
Faded thermal receipts?
Vision extraction reads many faded receipts, but very faded ones get low confidence and a needs-review flag — honest about what it can't read.
Itemized dishes?
Line items can be captured, but for meal expenses most people keep subtotal/tax/tip/total only.
Convert your own Restaurant receipt
Drop the PDF or a photo into the free converter — 10 pages/day, no signup, nothing stored. See also: the full guide.