An AI agent for the books FreeAgent clients leave unfinished
A bookkeeper or accountant opening a client's FreeAgent account can find the books half finished: bank transactions unexplained, receipts missing, invoices unpaid. FreeAgent is built for freelancers and small companies doing their own books. An AI agent can work through that backlog, client by client, and your bookkeeper has the last word on every explanation.
Unexplained bank transactions, payments without receipts, overdue invoices and each client's quarter under Making Tax Digital.
Proposed explanations and VAT treatments with the document attached, receipt requests, and a draft late-invoice email for the client to send.
What FreeAgent is and who runs it
FreeAgent is online accounting software for small businesses, freelancers, contractors and landlords, made in Edinburgh by FreeAgent, part of NatWest Group since 2018. It covers invoicing, expenses, bank feeds, payroll and Making Tax Digital submissions to HMRC.
Day to day it is often run by the business owner, not a finance team. Accountants and bookkeepers reach their clients' accounts through FreeAgent's Practice Dashboard, where an account manager looks after a list of clients.
How an AI agent can help finish FreeAgent books
Unexplained bank transactions worked through
FreeAgent says its AI categorises transactions and explains new ones from earlier descriptions, marking a guess for approval. For the rest, the agent proposes an explanation and VAT treatment, attaches the document where it has one, and lists the others for your bookkeeper.
Receipts requested from the client
FreeAgent says Smart Capture matches receipts to payments for approval. A payment with no receipt cannot be explained with confidence, so the agent asks the client for each one, with the date and amount, and reminds them until the bookkeeper has what the quarter needs.
The awkward email about a late invoice
A freelancer's late invoice is often one awkward email away from being paid. Once FreeAgent's own reminders have gone, the agent drafts that email for the client to send, notes the reply, and passes a dispute or request for time to pay to a person.
Quarterly updates kept on schedule
For clients sending quarterly updates under Making Tax Digital, the agent tracks whose FreeAgent account still has unexplained transactions as each deadline nears, and tells the account manager who needs a call.
Roles that work in FreeAgent
Bookkeeping data entry
Prepares explanations for the bank transactions a client has left, for your bookkeeper to approve.
Expense and receipt chasing
Asks clients for the receipts and bills behind unexplained payments, and keeps asking until they arrive.
Invoice and payment chasing
Follows up invoices still unpaid after FreeAgent's own reminders, and hands disputes to a person.
How the connection is set up
FreeAgent publishes an API for other software, reached through OAuth 2.0. A user logs in to FreeAgent and allows or denies the app. For practices there is an Accountancy Practice API, which FreeAgent enables for a practice that asks its integrations team and an account manager then authorises. The route is agreed with you first.
Approval in FreeAgent is allow or deny, and each part of the API asks for a minimum access level, so the role's user gets the level its work needs and nothing above it. Filing with HMRC stays with your people.
Questions owners ask
Our clients leave bank lines unexplained. Can the agent explain them?
Yes. FreeAgent says its AI categorises transactions, and its API includes bank transactions and their explanations. The agent, an Agent Resource managed as staff are, explains each line left, with its reason, for your bookkeeper to approve, and lists for a person anything it cannot support with a document rather than guess.
Will our clients see what the agent has done in their FreeAgent account?
What it prepares sits in the client's own FreeAgent account, because that is where the transactions are. Explanations are put forward for your bookkeeper to approve, and any message to a client is one your practice has approved. The agent files nothing on a client's behalf.
Can it work across every client on our Practice Dashboard?
FreeAgent publishes an Accountancy Practice API for this. An account manager authorises it, and FreeAgent says senior account managers can reach all the practice's clients and others fewer. Which clients are in scope is agreed with you first.
Will it submit VAT returns or quarterly updates to HMRC?
No. The agent gets the records ready: transactions explained, documents attached, gaps listed. Your bookkeeper or accountant reviews the figures and makes the submission from FreeAgent. The filing, and the judgement behind it, stay with a person.