Sort a year of bank transactions for a freelancer's tax filing with Gemini, Claude and Lumo
- Posted
- by Megan Ellis (XDA)
- Last checked
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- How we verify
Evidence: Article or interviewA newsletter, journalist or interview account of what happened.
PartialThe source says it only partly worked, or had a significant problem a person had to deal with.
What went wrong: Only Claude matched the manual income total; Lumo missed about a third of the income, and Gemini was close but not exact.
Context: In a comparison test: from a head-to-head chatbot review, not a standalone agent test.
Outcome
XDA's Megan Ellis, a freelancer who files taxes three times a year, gave the same bank and credit-card exports and prompts to the free plans of Lumo, Gemini and Claude. Lumo missed a month of medication payments and about a third of the income. Gemini made no obvious errors and came within $100 of the manual income total. Claude hit its usage limit within two prompts at peak times but was the only one to match the manually filtered income total. Ellis still plans to do most of the taxes by hand.
Agent
Prompt Recreated prompt
The source didn't share its exact prompt, so we wrote this from what it describes.
Run this task now, exactly as written below. Everything you need is here, so start straight away and only stop if something required is missing or a rule below tells you to. Goal: Sort a year of my bank and card transactions into the tables I need for my tax filing, and show your totals so I can check them. Fill in before running: - Bank and credit-card exports for the tax year: [UPLOAD CSV] - Categories I need (e.g. income, medical, home office): [LIST] - Words or payees to exclude from income (transfers, refunds): [LIST] - My own income total, if I have one: [AMOUNT] You're not my accountant or financial adviser. Show your working, label estimates as estimates, and tell me which points a professional or the official source should confirm. Rules: - Make one table per category with date, payee and amount, and a total at the bottom. - Before giving a total, say how many transactions you included and list any you weren't sure about. - Ask me before including or excluding anything ambiguous, like transfers between my own accounts. - If my own total doesn't match yours, show the difference line by line rather than recalculating in a loop. - Check facts that can change (prices, opening hours, dates, availability, rules) against the official source, and tell me anything you couldn't verify. Output: Copyable tables per category, a checklist of tax documents, and a short list of items for me to confirm. You'll know it worked when: every total reconciles with my bank exports and I've confirmed each uncertain item.
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Bank and credit-card exports for the tax year
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Your prompt
Run this task now, exactly as written below. Everything you need is here, so start straight away and only stop if something required is missing or a rule below tells you to. Goal: Sort a year of my bank and card transactions into the tables I need for my tax filing, and show your totals so I can check them. Fill in before running: - Bank and credit-card exports for the tax year: [UPLOAD CSV] - Categories I need (e.g. income, medical, home office): [LIST] - Words or payees to exclude from income (transfers, refunds): [LIST] - My own income total, if I have one: [AMOUNT] You're not my accountant or financial adviser. Show your working, label estimates as estimates, and tell me which points a professional or the official source should confirm. Rules: - Make one table per category with date, payee and amount, and a total at the bottom. - Before giving a total, say how many transactions you included and list any you weren't sure about. - Ask me before including or excluding anything ambiguous, like transfers between my own accounts. - If my own total doesn't match yours, show the difference line by line rather than recalculating in a loop. - Check facts that can change (prices, opening hours, dates, availability, rules) against the official source, and tell me anything you couldn't verify. Output: Copyable tables per category, a checklist of tax documents, and a short list of items for me to confirm. You'll know it worked when: every total reconciles with my bank exports and I've confirmed each uncertain item.
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Optional stronger version
Our rewrite with extra checks. The poster didn't test it.
Run this task now, exactly as written below. Everything you need is here, so start straight away and only stop if something required is missing or a rule below tells you to. Goal: Sort a year of my bank and card transactions into the tables I need for my tax filing, and show your totals so I can check them. Fill in before running: - Bank and credit-card exports for the tax year: [UPLOAD CSV] - Categories I need (e.g. income, medical, home office): [LIST] - Words or payees to exclude from income (transfers, refunds): [LIST] - My own income total, if I have one: [AMOUNT] You're not my accountant or financial adviser. Show your working, label estimates as estimates, and tell me which points a professional or the official source should confirm. Rules: - Make one table per category with date, payee and amount, and a total at the bottom. - Before giving a total, say how many transactions you included and list any you weren't sure about. - Ask me before including or excluding anything ambiguous, like transfers between my own accounts. - If my own total doesn't match yours, show the difference line by line rather than recalculating in a loop. - Check facts that can change (prices, opening hours, dates, availability, rules) against the official source, and tell me anything you couldn't verify. - Re-check one random month by listing every transaction you counted for it. Output: Copyable tables per category, a checklist of tax documents, and a short list of items for me to confirm. You'll know it worked when: every total reconciles with my bank exports and I've confirmed each uncertain item. Before you finish: re-read my goal and constraints, check your answer against each one, and list anything you assumed or couldn't confirm.
Source
https://www.xda-developers.com/using-gemini-claude-lumo-taxes/
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