Sensible vs Zera Books: Document Type Coverage
Sensible offers custom extraction for any document via API. Zera Books processes 4 financial document types with accounting-specific workflows: bank statements, financial statements, invoices, and checks.
When evaluating document processing tools, accountants often ask: "What types of documents can it handle?"
Sensible's answer: Any document you can configure extraction rules for. It's a developer platform that lets you build custom parsers for contracts, legal documents, medical records, tax forms—anything with structured or semi-structured data.
Zera Books' answer: Four financial document types that accountants process daily—bank statements, financial statements, invoices, and checks. No configuration required, because Zera AI is pre-trained on millions of these specific document types.
This comparison examines document type coverage, accounting-specific features, and why breadth of capability doesn't always equal usefulness for accounting workflows.
Document Type Coverage Comparison
Sensible
Custom extraction for any document
Supported Documents:
Any document you configure extraction rules for—contracts, invoices, tax forms, medical records, legal documents, insurance claims, etc.
How It Works:
- 1.Define extraction rules for each document type
- 2.Configure visual layout matching or LLM-based parsing
- 3.Test and refine rules with sample documents
- 4.Integrate via API into your application
Best for: Software teams building custom document workflows
Zera Books
Pre-trained for 4 financial document types
Supported Documents:
- Bank statements (checking, savings, credit cards)
- Financial statements (P&L, balance sheets, cash flow)
- Invoices (vendor invoices with line items)
- Checks (check images, MICR lines)
How It Works:
- 1.Upload document (drag-and-drop interface)
- 2.Zera AI automatically extracts and categorizes
- 3.Review extracted data in web dashboard
- 4.Export to QuickBooks/Xero (pre-categorized)
Best for: Accountants processing financial documents
Zera Books: 4 Document Types Accountants Actually Need
Sensible can extract from any document. Zera Books focuses on the four document types that accounting professionals process hundreds of times per month.
1. Bank Statements
Checking accounts, savings accounts, credit card statements from any bank worldwide.
Transaction-level extraction: Date, description, amount, running balance for every transaction
Multi-account auto-detection: Automatically separates checking, savings, and credit cards from single PDF
AI categorization: Maps transactions to QuickBooks/Xero chart of accounts automatically
Any bank format: Zera AI trained on millions of bank statements, handles all formats dynamically
2. Financial Statements
Income statements (P&L), balance sheets, and cash flow statements.
Line item extraction: Every account, category, subtotal, and total extracted accurately
Multi-period support: Handles comparative statements (month-over-month, year-over-year)
Standard GAAP formats: Recognizes standard accounting layouts and custom client formats
3. Invoices
Vendor invoices with line items, totals, tax amounts, and payment terms.
Header data: Invoice number, date, vendor, due date, payment terms
Line item extraction: Description, quantity, unit price, line total for each item
Tax and totals: Subtotal, tax amounts, discounts, final total automatically extracted
Any vendor format: Works with invoices from any vendor without template training
4. Checks
Check images from scanned copies, mobile deposits, or check printing software.
MICR line extraction: Routing number, account number, check number from magnetic ink line
Check details: Payee, date, amount (numerical and written), memo line
Image quality handling: Zera OCR processes scanned checks, photos, and digital images
Why These 4 Document Types?
These are the documents accountants process most frequently for client bookkeeping, tax preparation, financial reporting, and reconciliation. By focusing on these four types, Zera Books delivers 99.6% extraction accuracy without requiring configuration or template training.
What Sensible Covers: The Developer Approach
Sensible doesn't limit you to specific document types. Instead, it provides tools for developers to build custom extraction rules for any document.
Document Types Sensible Can Handle:
- •Contracts (legal agreements, MSAs, SOWs)
- •Tax forms (1040, W-2, 1099, etc.)
- •Medical records (lab results, prescriptions)
- •Insurance claims and policies
- •Loan applications and disclosures
- •Real estate documents (leases, deeds)
- •Pay stubs and employment records
- •Government forms and permits
- •Invoices (with custom configuration)
- •Bank statements (with custom configuration)
The Trade-Off: Breadth vs Depth
Sensible's strength: It can extract from documents Zera Books doesn't support—contracts, tax forms, medical records, legal documents. If you're building software that needs to process non-financial documents, Sensible provides the flexibility.
Sensible's limitation for accountants: To extract bank statements or invoices, you must configure extraction rules, test with sample documents, and potentially maintain those configurations when document formats change. There's no accounting-specific categorization, no QuickBooks integration, no client management dashboard.
Zera Books' approach: Deep expertise in financial documents. Zera AI is pre-trained on 3.2 million+ financial documents—it already knows what a bank statement looks like, how to extract transactions, and how to categorize them for accounting software.
Why Accounting-Specific Document Coverage Matters
"My clients send me all kinds of messy PDFs from different banks. This tool handles them all and saves me probably 10 hours a week that I used to spend on manual entry."
Ashish Josan
Manager, CPA
Document types processed weekly:
- Bank statements: 50-75 per week across 20+ clients
- Credit card statements: 30-40 per week
- Vendor invoices: 100+ per month
- Client checks: 20-30 per month
"These four document types represent 95% of what we process. We don't need contracts or tax forms extracted—we need bank statements categorized for QuickBooks."
Feature Comparison: Document Coverage
| Feature | Sensible | Zera Books |
|---|---|---|
| Bank Statements | Custom configuration | Pre-trained, instant |
| Financial Statements | Custom configuration | Pre-trained, instant |
| Invoices | Custom configuration | Pre-trained, instant |
| Checks | Custom configuration | Pre-trained, instant |
| AI Categorization | No | Yes (QuickBooks/Xero) |
| Setup Time | Days (config + testing) | 5 minutes |
| Contracts | Yes (custom) | No |
| Tax Forms | Yes (custom) | No |
| Medical Records | Yes (custom) | No |
| Legal Documents | Yes (custom) | No |
| Cost | $499/month (750 docs) | $79/month (unlimited) |
Which Document Coverage Do You Need?
Sensible's broad coverage fits when:
You're building software: Integrating document extraction into a product, not manually processing documents for clients
You need non-financial documents: Contracts, medical records, legal forms, tax documents beyond bank statements
You have developer resources: Team available to configure extraction rules and maintain them
Zera Books' focused coverage fits when:
You're an accountant: Processing bank statements, invoices, checks, and financial statements for clients
You need QuickBooks/Xero integration: Want transactions auto-categorized and formatted for import
You want instant results: No time for configuration—need to upload and convert immediately
You process high volumes: Unlimited conversions vs 750 extraction cap at 6x lower price
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Compare toolsTransparent Pricing
$79/month unlimited conversions
View pricingProcess Financial Documents Without Configuration
Bank statements, financial statements, invoices, and checks—all processed automatically with AI categorization for QuickBooks and Xero. $79/month unlimited.
Try for one weekPre-trained on 3.2M+ documents. 99.6% accuracy. Zero configuration.