Supplier Matching

Before Brikly can match individual line items to ingredients, it needs to know which supplier the invoice came from. The system identifies suppliers automatically and links invoices to the correct supplier record in your account.

How suppliers are identified

When an invoice is processed, the AI extracts the supplier name from the document header, letterhead, or footer. Brikly then compares that name against the suppliers already in your system using:

• Exact name matching - a direct comparison with your existing supplier records.
• Fuzzy matching - accounting for minor variations in spelling, abbreviations, and formatting.
• Name normalisation - handling common business suffixes and their variations.
• Registration number matching - falling back to the VAT or company number on the invoice when the name alone is not enough.

Auto-confirmation for known suppliers

If the extracted supplier name closely matches an existing supplier in your account, Brikly links the invoice automatically. This is the most common scenario once you have processed a few invoices - the supplier is recognised instantly and no action is required from you.

Confirming a suggested supplier

When the system finds a likely match but is not fully confident, it presents a suggestion for you to confirm:

1. The suggested supplier name is displayed alongside the extracted name.
2. Review the suggestion.
3. Click Confirm to accept, or Change to select a different supplier.

tip

Check the supplier's previous invoices if you are unsure whether a suggestion is correct. The Invoices tab on the supplier's page shows the documents linked to that supplier.

Matching on the registration number

Names alone cannot always tell two suppliers apart. A wholesaler might appear as Creed on one delivery note and CREED FOODSERVICE LIMITED on the next, which looks no different to a name comparison than two genuinely separate businesses that happen to share a word, such as Cotswold Foods and Cotswold Cheese Company.

To settle those cases, Brikly reads the VAT or company registration number printed on the invoice and checks it against the numbers already recorded against your suppliers. This runs only after name matching has finished without a result, so it changes nothing about invoices that were already being matched correctly.

What Brikly finds	What happens
The number belongs to one of your suppliers	The invoice is linked to that supplier automatically
The number is on two or more of your suppliers	The invoice waits for you to confirm, and the duplicate is flagged on the Suppliers page
The number is not on any supplier, or the invoice does not show one	Matching continues as normal, and a new supplier may be created

Brikly records the registration number whenever it resolves an invoice to a supplier, so your existing suppliers pick theirs up as you work through invoices.

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A registration number is only ever used as evidence that two records are the same supplier. It is never used to conclude that they are different, because scanning occasionally misreads a digit, and a misread number should not split one supplier into two.

Creating a new supplier from an invoice

If the invoice is from a supplier you have not added to Brikly yet:

1. Click Create New Supplier on the supplier matching screen.
2. Brikly pre-fills the supplier name from the extracted data.
3. Add any additional details (contact information, account number, default VAT treatment).
4. Save - the invoice is automatically linked to the new supplier.

This means you do not need to set up suppliers in advance. Your supplier list builds naturally as you process invoices.

Name normalisation

Supplier names on invoices are not always consistent. The same company might appear as:

Variation	Normalised to
Acme Foods Ltd	Acme Foods
Acme Foods Limited	Acme Foods
Acme Foods Ltd.	Acme Foods
ACME FOODS LTD	Acme Foods
acme foods	Acme Foods

Brikly strips common suffixes (Ltd, Limited, Inc, PLC, LLP, & Co) and normalises capitalisation before comparing. This prevents duplicate supplier records caused by minor formatting differences.

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If you notice the same supplier has been created more than once (e.g. "Brakes" and "Brakes Group Ltd"), you can merge them from the supplier management screen. Future invoices will then match to the single merged record.

How supplier matching improves over time

Like ingredient matching, supplier identification becomes more reliable with use:

• The first invoice from a new supplier requires manual confirmation or creation.
• Subsequent invoices from the same supplier are matched automatically.
• If a supplier changes their invoice format or branding, you may need to confirm the match once - after that, the new format is remembered.

Best practices

• Keep supplier names clean - use a consistent, readable name for each supplier (e.g. "Brakes" rather than "BRAKES GROUP LIMITED").
• Merge duplicates promptly - if two records exist for the same supplier, merge them to keep your data tidy and improve future matching.
• Add key details - filling in a supplier's account number or VAT number helps with identification and record-keeping.