Bank feeds, and what they actually do

Connecting your bank removes the typing, not the thinking. The import is the easy half: deciding what each transaction was remains yours. This page explains both routes into Taxmo, what each one can reach, and where each one stops.

Two routes in, and they are not equivalent

There is an Open Banking connection and there is a CSV statement upload. They solve different problems and it is worth knowing which you need before you start.

  • Open Banking: you authorise at your own bank, no credentials touch Taxmo, and a recent window of transactions comes across
  • CSV upload: you export a statement from your bank and upload the file, with no window limit, which is the route for older periods
  • Both land in the same review queue and are subject to the same approval step
  • Neither is a substitute for keeping the receipt behind the transaction

Read-only by design

An Open Banking connection for accounting is account information only. It reads transactions and balances. It cannot move money, and it should not ask for the ability to. You grant access at your bank's own sign-in screen, so your banking credentials are never entered into Taxmo, and you can revoke that access at your bank at any time, independently of us.

On-demand, not a background sync

This is the part most software glosses over and it changes how you plan your bookkeeping. Taxmo's UK Open Banking connection is an on-demand import: you re-authorise at your bank each time you pull transactions, and each pull returns a recent window rather than your entire history. There is no long-lived consent quietly syncing overnight, which means no silent failure when a consent expires, and it also means the import happens when you sit down to do it. For anything outside that window, export a CSV statement instead.

Import, then review

Transactions arrive as pending and are not in your figures until you approve them. That is deliberate: an unreviewed import is a guess about what a payment was for, and a guess in your VAT return is worse than a gap. Categorisation rules you set once are applied on the way in, so review is usually confirming rather than typing.

Reconciliation is still the point

Matching what the bank says against what you recorded is what catches the missing invoice, the duplicate, and the payment that never arrived. Automation makes it fast rather than unnecessary. The pre-filing checklist treats unreviewed imports as a blocking problem for exactly this reason: they are not in your VAT figures, so filing with them sitting there files an understated return.

Common questions

Is it safe to connect my bank?

The connection is read-only account information, and it is authorised by you at your own bank rather than by handing over your banking password. Taxmo never sees or stores your bank credentials. You can revoke the access at your bank at any time, independently of us, and revoking it does not remove transactions you have already imported and approved.

How far back do transactions go?

The Open Banking route returns a recent window rather than your full history, so it is the wrong tool for catching up on an old period. Upload a CSV statement for anything older: there is no window limit on a file you export yourself, and the two routes can be mixed on the same account without creating duplicates, because imports are matched before they land.

Does it sync automatically in the background?

No, and we would rather say so than imply otherwise. UK bank imports in Taxmo are on-demand: you re-authorise at your bank for each import. The trade-off is real in both directions. You never get a stale feed that silently stopped working when a consent lapsed, but you do have to trigger the import yourself rather than finding it already done.

Which UK banks work?

Open Banking connection goes through the provider's hosted bank selection screen, which covers UK current accounts broadly. For CSV upload, Taxmo detects the statement format of Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds, NatWest and RBS, Starling, Monzo and Revolut automatically, and falls back to a generic column mapping for anything else, so an unrecognised bank is still an upload rather than a dead end.

Do I still need to keep receipts?

Yes. A bank line proves that money moved, not what it bought or how much VAT it carried. HMRC's interest is in the evidence behind the figure, and for a VAT reclaim the VAT invoice is that evidence, not the bank line. The feed and the receipts do different jobs and you need both.

Do imported transactions go into my VAT return automatically?

No. They sit as pending until you approve them, and only approved transactions reach your figures. This is why the pre-filing checklist blocks on unreviewed imports: an approval step you skipped is an understated return, and that is a correction rather than a rounding error.

Last updated 2026-08-10. Thresholds, rates and allowances are indexed or reset at fiscal events and are deliberately not quoted here; check GOV.UK for current amounts.