Convert American Express bank statements to CSV, QBO CSV, or Xero

Convert a statement now

Drop a PDF statement below. It is parsed in this browser tab: the file is not uploaded, and you can watch the Network tab while it runs. You get an editable preview, a reconciliation stamp, and CSV downloads for QuickBooks Online, Xero, or anything that reads plain CSV. No signup and no card for the first 20 pages each month.

How a American Express statement is laid out

The Account Summary is the anchor of an Amex statement. It reports Previous Balance, Payments and Credits, Purchases (your new charges), Balance Transfers, Cash Advances, Fees Charged, Interest Charged, and the New Balance, so the whole cycle is expressed as one arithmetic block rather than a chain of balances. Below it sit the Payment Information (current balance, minimum payment, due date), any late-payment and minimum-payment warnings, a rewards balance on rewards cards, and account messages. Transaction History comes next: each charge shows a posted date, the vendor name and location, and an amount, with an optional spending category. Payments and credits carry a minus sign or a CR marker; charges are positive. If your account has additional cardholders, the charges section repeats per card with its own subtotal and then an account grand total, which is why section-aware parsing matters. A Fees and Interest Charged summary and an interest-rate breakdown by transaction type close out the document. Because no running balance is printed, verification relies on the summary totals, not on chaining each row to the next.

• Running balance: false.
• Dates: MM/DD/YY.
• Negative amounts: Payments and credits shown with a leading minus sign or a CR marker; new charges shown as positive amounts.
• The Account Summary sits at the top and shows Previous Balance, Payments and Credits, Purchases (New Charges), Balance Transfers, Cash Advances, Fees Charged, Interest Charged, and New Balance.
• This is a credit-card statement, so there is no per-transaction running balance column. The balance chain is a summary block: Previous Balance minus Payments/Credits plus Purchases plus Fees plus Interest equals New Balance.
• Transaction History lists each charge with a posted date, the vendor name and location, and an amount. Spending category may also appear.
• On accounts with additional (supplementary) cards, charges are itemized and subtotaled per cardholder, with a grand total for the whole account.
• A Fees and Interest Charged summary and an interest-rate breakdown by transaction type appear toward the end.

How to download statements from American Express

1. Sign in to your account at americanexpress.com on a web browser.
2. On the account home page, select 'Statements & Activity'.
3. Pick the statement you want from the list. American Express keeps the last two years of statements available online.
4. Select 'View' to open the statement, then 'Download' and choose the PDF format to save a copy.
5. Older statements that have been archived are made available online within about 24 hours after you request them.

American Express conversion pitfalls

No running balance to chain, so expect statement-level verification

Credit-card statements do not print a running balance after each transaction. Instead of a row-by-row chain, the converter checks the Account Summary math: Previous Balance minus Payments and Credits plus Purchases plus Fees plus Interest should equal the New Balance. If those totals tie out you get a statement-verified stamp; if a section total is missing or does not add up, the export is flagged rather than exported as clean.

Downloading directly from Amex may not offer a QBO option

American Express lets you download transactions as PDF, Excel, or CSV, but a QuickBooks Web Connect (QBO) file is often not offered in the download menu, and users have reported ongoing trouble connecting Amex directly to QuickBooks. Converting the PDF statement to CSV or QBO on your own side avoids waiting on that connection.

Supplementary-card subtotals can be mistaken for extra transactions

When an account has additional cardholders, the statement repeats a charges section per card with its own subtotal before the account grand total. A parser that is not section-aware can double-count those subtotal lines. The converter treats subtotal and total lines as summary rows, not transactions, so the row list matches the charges only.

Rewards and points entries are not money movements

Membership Rewards summaries and point balances can appear near the top of the statement. These are not dollar transactions and should not enter the ledger. Only the dated charges, payments, and credits belong in your import.

Importing the CSV into QuickBooks Online

In QuickBooks Online go to Transactions, then Bank transactions, choose the account, and pick Upload from file. The converter's default export is the 3-column format QuickBooks expects: Date, Description, Amount, with one signed amount per row. A 4-column Date, Description, Credit, Debit file is available too, but QuickBooks parses the 3-column shape more reliably.

Three constraints matter. Dates must be MM/DD/YYYY for US companies, and one unreadable date fails the whole import. Files over 350 KB, roughly 1,000 rows, are rejected, so this converter splits large exports into date-ranged files automatically. And QuickBooks ignores any category column in a CSV: every imported transaction lands in For Review for you to categorize with bank rules.

• For QuickBooks Online, export as a single signed-amount CSV: Date, Description, Amount, where charges are negative (money out of the card as a liability) and payments and credits are positive. Confirm the sign direction matches how your credit-card account is set up in QuickBooks.
• Dates convert to MM/DD/YYYY for a US QuickBooks Online company file.
• Because there is no running balance, expect a statement-verified state driven by the Account Summary totals, or an honest unverifiable flag if a summary total cannot be read. QuickBooks does not check statement math on import, so the converter's summary check is where the tie-out happens.
• QuickBooks Online rejects very large single imports; files auto-split near 350KB or about 1,000 rows, which keeps long multi-card statements under the limit.
• Amounts export without currency symbols or thousands separators, since QuickBooks rejects rows that contain a dollar sign or comma in the amount.

Importing into Xero

For Xero, the export uses Date and a single signed Amount, income positive, plus Payee, Description, and Reference columns. Import it under the bank account's Import a Statement option. Xero reads dates by your organisation's region setting, so check the day and month order match before you post.

How the reconciliation gate works

Most converters hand you a spreadsheet and leave the checking to you. This one does the arithmetic first. A bank statement carries its own proof: balances. If the rows are right, they add up to the printed balances; if a digit was misread or a row was dropped, they do not.

Every export gets one of five stamps. Verified row-by-row means each transaction was checked against a printed running balance. Verified at statement level means the opening balance plus all transactions equals the closing balance. Partially verified means daily balance figures anchored some of the rows. Unverifiable means the statement printed no balances to check against, so honesty is the stamp. Reconciliation failed means the math did not hold, and the exact failing rows are marked in the grid so you can fix or confirm them before export.

The stamp is a verification aid, not a guarantee. It shows you which rows the statement's own math confirms, so you verify three rows instead of three hundred.

Statements never leave this browser. There is no upload to vet, no processor to add to your WISP paperwork, and nothing stored when the tab closes. Open the Network tab during a conversion and watch: the page explains exactly what it sends and when, and none of it is your document.

Frequently asked questions

Does an American Express statement have a running balance I can reconcile against?

No. Like most credit-card statements, an Amex statement uses an Account Summary block (Previous Balance, Payments and Credits, Purchases, Fees, Interest, New Balance) rather than a running balance after each transaction. The converter verifies that summary math instead of chaining row balances.

How far back can I download American Express statements?

American Express keeps the previous two years of statements available online to view and download as PDF. Archived older statements can be requested and are usually made available online within about 24 hours.

Why can't I get a QBO file straight from American Express?

The Amex download menu commonly offers PDF, Excel, and CSV but not always a QuickBooks Web Connect (QBO) file, and direct QuickBooks connections have been unreliable for some users. Converting your PDF statement to CSV or QBO yourself sidesteps that.

How are payments and credits shown on the statement?

Payments and credits appear with a minus sign or a CR marker, while new charges appear as positive amounts. On export you choose the sign convention that matches your credit-card account in QuickBooks or Xero.

What happens with additional cardholders on one account?

Charges are itemized and subtotaled per additional card, with a grand total for the account. The converter reads each cardholder's charges as transactions and treats the subtotals and grand total as summary rows, so nothing is double-counted.

Is my statement uploaded anywhere when I convert it?

No. The conversion runs in your browser on this page. The PDF is read on your device and the CSV, QBO, or Xero file is built locally. You can open your browser's Network tab and watch that nothing containing your statement leaves the page.