Uploading spreadsheets for AI assistance

Choose the right worksheet, review extracted information and understand file limits and privacy.

Use CSV or Excel .xlsx in the existing AI upload controls for loan setup, loan repayment history, individual holdings, and portfolio creation or valuation updates. The loan and portfolio panels opened from Assets use these same controls. This does not add an AI uploader to categories which do not already have one.

Choose, inspect, review

1. Choose your document. PDF and supported images still work; CSV and .xlsx now work too.
2. For a spreadsheet, Fieldwell checks the file first without sending it to AI. Select one visible worksheet and check the row preview and warnings. CSV appears as one sheet called CSV.
3. Choose Use selected sheet with AI to send the selected sheet's values to Perplexity. Hidden sheets and other unselected sheets are not sent. To use another sheet, make a separate upload.
4. Review the extracted fields or records in the existing panel. Correct uncertain figures, dates and currencies. Uploading does not save a loan, holding, portfolio or repayment.
5. Save or import only after reviewing the financial result.

Use Cancel spreadsheet to discard the selection, or Cancel inspection while the file is being checked. For large workbooks, export only the relevant table as a smaller file. Do not split a summary and its component rows into separate imports and count both.

Supported files and limits

• Documents: PDF, PNG, JPEG, WebP, HEIC/HEIF, UTF-8 CSV and .xlsx. Maximum file size is 25 MB.
• CSV: consistent comma, semicolon or tab separators; quoted delimiters and multiline cells are supported. Save other encodings as UTF-8 CSV first.
• Excel: up to 20 sheets, 2,000 rows and 60 columns per sheet, with a 40,000-cell total reading budget. Hidden sheets are not available for selection.
• Additional bounds: 4,000 characters per cell and 300,000 characters of extracted table data. Compressed-workbook safety checks also limit expanded size and compression ratio, so a small file can still be rejected.
• Repayment history: the existing 200-payment limit still applies. The general reader's larger row budget does not raise the loan importer limit.
• Not supported: legacy .xls, .xlsb, macro-enabled workbooks, encrypted/password-protected workbooks, embedded objects, or external data connections. Save a plain .xlsx or export the required sheet as CSV.

Files over a reading limit are rejected, not silently cut down. The preview intentionally shows only the first four rows and shortens long cell text; the selected sheet is not shortened for AI extraction. A full extraction is still subject to AI interpretation and the destination's validation rules, so compare it with the source.

Formulas, missing data and duplicates

Fieldwell never recalculates spreadsheet formulas. For .xlsx, it reads the saved result, which can be stale; formulas without a saved result remain blank. Save a recalculated workbook in Excel before uploading if needed. Formula-like CSV cells remain inert text, not executable instructions.

Spreadsheet formatting is not a reliable source of currency or accounting meaning. Include explicit currency codes and descriptive column headings, and prefer unambiguous dates. Blank values are unknown, not zero. Zero interest and zero tax must be explicitly supported by the source or confirmed during review.

Totals and subtotals should not become extra holdings or extra receipts. AI is instructed to distinguish them, but this is not a guarantee: check the extracted detail and any reconciliation total. Loan history retains its duplicate checks, principal/interest/withholding separation, review confirmation and transactional save. Portfolio imports retain their existing matching, reconciliation and apply flow; this change does not introduce a universal duplicate detector across unrelated documents.

For a spreadsheet with multiple holdings, use the portfolio importer rather than the single-holding panel. The single-holding extractor must not arbitrarily choose a holding when the intended position is ambiguous.

Privacy and safeguards

Spreadsheet inspection and conversion happen in Fieldwell. Only the selected visible sheet's bounded values, source sheet name and warnings are sent for AI extraction. Raw workbooks are not published as temporary download URLs. Spreadsheet uploads are not added to a permanent document library; upload bytes and parsing results are held transiently in memory. Existing portfolio review sessions can retain the extracted draft until their normal expiry.

PDF/image extraction still uses the existing random, expiring, one-use attachment URL. Access requires an authenticated household member with write permission. Spreadsheet checks include archive/XML validation, memory- and time-limited parsing, no formula execution, and locally validated AI outputs.

No upload mechanism is risk-free. These controls reduce the attack surface; they are not a malware-free certification. There is currently no dedicated antivirus scanning service in this pipeline. Do not upload files from untrusted senders merely because a file extension is allowed.