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Analyze bank statements and categorize spending with monthly Slack reports

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Created by: PDF Vector || pdfvector

PDF Vector

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Last update a day ago

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Who is this for

Individuals managing personal finances, freelancers tracking business expenses, or small business owners who want automated insights from their bank statements without manual spreadsheet work.
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What it does

This workflow automatically processes bank statements received via email, extracts every transaction, categorizes spending using AI, calculates your savings rate, identifies large transactions, and sends you a detailed monthly summary via Slack.

How it works

  • Gmail trigger monitors your inbox for bank statement emails
  • PDF Vector extracts all transactions with dates, amounts, descriptions, and running balances
  • AI categorizes each transaction into: Income, Utilities, Groceries, Dining, Shopping, Transport, Travel, Subscriptions, Healthcare, Entertainment, or Transfer
  • Smart categorization rules recognize common merchants (Uber → Transport, Netflix → Subscriptions, Whole Foods → Groceries)
  • Code node calculates totals, savings rate, and spending percentages by category
  • Flags large transactions over $500 for visibility
  • Logs monthly summary to Google Sheets
  • Sends detailed analysis report to Slack

Setup steps

  1. Connect Gmail OAuth2 credentials
  2. Get PDF Vector API key from pdfvector.com/api-keys
  3. Create a Google Sheet with columns: Period Start, Period End, Opening Balance, Closing Balance, Total Income, Total Spending, Savings Rate %, Transaction Count, Processed Date
  4. Connect Slack and select your notification channel
  5. Update the Google Sheet ID in the Sheets node

Requirements

  • Gmail account (OAuth2)
  • PDF Vector API key (community node - self-hosted n8n only)
  • Google Sheets account (OAuth2)
  • Slack workspace with API access

Analysis included

  • Total income vs spending comparison
  • Savings rate percentage calculation
  • Spending breakdown by category with percentages
  • Large transaction alerts (over $500)
  • Transaction count per statement

Spending categories

Income, Utilities, Groceries, Dining, Shopping, Transport, Travel, Subscriptions, Healthcare, Entertainment, Transfer, Other

Customization ideas

  • Adjust the large transaction threshold from $500
  • Add budget alerts when category spending exceeds limits
  • Connect to Notion for a personal finance dashboard
  • Add weekly summaries instead of monthly
  • Export individual transactions to a separate sheet for detailed tracking