ChatGPT can explain how to book something. It cannot do the booking.
The short answer to the question you arrived with: no. ChatGPT can explain in detail which ledger account something belongs on, but it cannot look into your Moneybird and it cannot put anything there. That is not a matter of a better prompt, it simply has no access. So Schakel is not built on ChatGPT. We run our own assistant, on DeepSeek, that is attached to your administration and, after your confirmation, really does the booking. Below is what that difference gets you, job by job.
What that looks like
What the assistant does
What this automation does, and when.
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A photo of a receipt
A photo or PDF is enough. The supplier, amount, VAT rate and date are read from it and you are asked which project it belongs to. After your confirmation it sits in Moneybird as a purchase invoice with the file attached.
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An invoice or quote from one sentence
You say for whom, what and how much. You see the draft with contact, lines, VAT rate, project and total, and only then is it in Moneybird. Turning a quote into an invoice works the same way.
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Questions about your own figures
What is outstanding, how much revenue did I do, how much VAT for this quarter, how many hours are still uninvoiced. Asking never changes anything in your administration.
What a chat window can do, and what is left over for you
This is not meant to talk ChatGPT down. For explaining, summarising and thinking along it is excellent. It goes wrong in exactly one place: the end. Every row below ends, with a chat window, in work you still have to do by hand.
A receipt from the hardware store
Reads the photo and names the amount and the VAT. Then you log into Moneybird, create the purchase invoice, retype it all and attach the photo yourself.
Reads the photo, asks which project it belongs to, and after your yes books it as a purchase invoice with the file attached.
An invoice for a customer
Writes a tidy description and works out the VAT. Looking up the contact, entering the lines and getting a number assigned you do yourself.
Looks the contact up in your administration, prepares the lines and the VAT rate, shows the draft and creates it after your yes.
What is still outstanding?
Does not know. You first pull an overview out of Moneybird and paste it in, and then the answer applies to that file.
Answers from your own administration: how many invoices, how many overdue, the oldest, the total, and which invoices those are.
Money arrives in the bank
Notices nothing. You work out which invoice it belongs to and link it.
Holds the payment against your open invoices, gives a confidence of 0 to 100 and the reason, and books after your yes.
Money left and there is no receipt
Does not know it happened. The cost never lands in your books and the VAT is never reclaimed.
Asks for the receipt, reminds you once and then stops. Send it and it is booked and tied to that payment.
An invoice goes overdue
Happens in silence. You find out when you go and look, which is usually later than you would like.
Sends you a message with the invoice number, the customer, the amount and how many days past due. That notification is a switch you can turn off.
It knows nothing about your business
Every conversation starts blank. That one supplier always belongs to one project you explain again every time.
Asks whether it may remember that and puts it as a card in your dashboard, with who wrote it. You can switch it off.
In short: the difference is not how clever the model is, it is whether it may reach your administration and whether it may write back. No prompt solves the first one.
What it saves you
- The answer ends in your bookkeeping instead of in your clipboard.
- Receipts are done the moment you photograph them.
- You need to know nothing about ledger accounts for it to land correctly.
- Nothing is recorded before you have seen the draft.
Setting it up
- 01
Connect your Moneybird
You grant access once through Moneybird itself. No keys to copy and no software to install.
- 02
Send your first receipt
Photograph one you still had to book anyway. You see what was read from it and what is about to be booked before you say yes.
- 03
Let it learn your habits
Say once that a regular supplier belongs to a particular project. After that it stops asking, and you can always switch that card off again.
What you need
- A Moneybird administration you administer
- A Schakel account for the chat and your knowledge cards
- A phone or computer to send your receipts from
Not sure how to get those keys? Step by step:
Where it runs
On app.schakel.app, with your own Schakel account. No webshop required.
Then from €10 a month billed yearly, or stay on free. See the tiers
Set the automation upRelated connections
Connect a different pair
Schakel also links two systems to each other directly. Pick two and see what travels between them.
Common questions
Is this ChatGPT with a Moneybird connection?
No. It is Schakel’s own assistant, with DeepSeek as its language model. You connect no ChatGPT account and you need no subscription there.
Can I use my own ChatGPT subscription?
No. There is one assistant and it runs with us. What you pay at ChatGPT has no bearing here, in either direction.
So does it do my whole bookkeeping?
It does the data entry: invoices, quotes, receipts, hours, contacts and payments. Your returns and annual accounts stay with you or your bookkeeper.
What if it misreads an amount on a photo?
You see it in the draft, because it shows that before anything is recorded. You correct it in the chat and only then is it in Moneybird.
Can I use it from my phone?
The chat lives in your Schakel dashboard and works fine in your mobile browser. With the WhatsApp add-on you talk to the same assistant over WhatsApp.
Does it send invoices to my customers?
Only if you ask, and even then only after your confirmation. Sending is a separate action and sits deliberately last on the list, because it reaches somebody other than you.
Can you connect ChatGPT to Moneybird?
Yes. Schakel connects through the official APIs of ChatGPT and Moneybird, so you install nothing on your own server and nothing travels outside those two parties.
Which VAT rate do my sales get in Moneybird?
The rate is set per line: 21%, 9% or 0%. Sales to Belgium and other EU countries get the rate of the destination country, ready for your OSS return.