Common issues
- "I forwarded an email and nothing showed up." See Troubleshooting. Most often the attachment was inline HTML rather than a real attachment.
- "Some attachments were skipped." Tally skips attachments it doesn't recognise as documents — logos and signature images in an email footer are the usual cause. Individual attachments over 15 MB are also skipped, and an email over 50 MB in total is rejected.
- "The vendor email is spammy and Tally extracted it as a real invoice." Reject the document — Tally won't remember it as a real charge.
- "I want to stop a vendor from auto-extracting." Set up a filter in your email client to NOT forward those emails. Tally only sees what you forward.
Forwarding rules
For recurring invoices (Stripe monthly, Adobe quarterly, your accountant's monthly bill, etc.), set up a forwarding rule in your email client:
Subject contains 'Stripe receipt' → forward to <your-Tally-address>From contains '[email protected]' → forward to <your-Tally-address>
Tally extracts the attachment from each forwarded email and creates a document. The email metadata (sender, subject, date) is preserved as part of the document's audit trail.
Getting your forwarding address
- Open Settings → Inbox.
- Once Inbox forwarding has been activated, you'll see your workspace's unique forwarding address in the Inbox panel. It's unique to your workspace and not guessable. Before activation the panel explains how to get set up instead.
- Copy it.
- Set up forwarding from your work email (Gmail, Outlook, etc.) — either always-forward or on a per-message basis.
The address is unique to your workspace. Forwarding from a different email is fine; what matters is the destination address.
If you're a bookkeeper using Inbox for clients
Each client workspace has its own forwarding address. You can:
- Have the client set up forwarding to their own address.
- Or forward documents on the client's behalf from your own email — Tally treats them the same way.
When Tally drafts a vendor follow-up for a client, it shows up in your review queue (Bookkeeper Command Center → that client's drilldown). You approve or decline; the email goes out from the client's domain (configured in their Inbox settings).
Inbox Starter — the standalone product
If you want email intake and extraction without the rest of Tally, the standalone Inbox Starter plan covers it: a forwarding address, document extraction, delivery to a webhook you configure, and a delivery log recording every attempt and its outcome. $29/month, activated through onboarding rather than self-serve signup — contact support to request access.
Standalone Inbox delivers to one destination: an HTTPS webhook you supply. You set a target URL and a signing secret in the standalone dashboard, and each extracted document is posted there for your own system to consume. It does not connect to QuickBooks and does not create Bills — if you want documents pushed to QuickBooks Online, that is Tally (Starter and above), not standalone Inbox.
Standalone Inbox is also a separate account model — you don't get Tally's memory layer or the Memory page. It's built for someone who wants email intake piped into a system they already run.
Tally drafts vendor follow-up emails
When Tally flags an anomaly on a high-severity document (charge way outside this vendor's normal range, suspicious-looking invoice), she can draft a reply email to the vendor for your review. You see the draft, edit it if you want, and either approve-and-send or decline.
Same flow for W-9 requests on contractors who haven't returned their tax form, and for "I think we already paid this" responses to duplicate invoices.
This is opt-in — Tally never sends an email without your approval. Available on Pro and above.
What gets extracted
For each forwarded email:
- Attached PDF/image invoices are processed — vendor, amount, date, line items, category — same as a direct upload.
- Inline-only emails (no attachment) are skipped. Tally needs an attached document to extract from.
- Multi-attachment emails — every document attachment on an email is processed, each classified on its own merits. Attachments that aren't documents (logos, signature images) are skipped.
What's next
- Documents — review and approve
- How Tally learns — including how vendor follow-up drafts learn from your reviews
- Plans and billing — Inbox tier availability
- Troubleshooting
What you'll do
- Get your forwarding address.
- Forward invoices from your email and watch them appear.
- Use forwarding rules to automate the routing of recurring vendors.
- Let Tally draft vendor follow-up emails (anomaly replies, W-9 requests, payment confirmations).