The budget does not go wrong when you set it. It goes wrong in the three weeks between a quote arriving and somebody typing it in, because in those three weeks you book the photographer on a number you remember rather than the number on the page. Reading quotes is exactly the kind of work AI does well: exact, tedious, and easy to check. Here is how to hand it over without handing over the decisions.
Two ways in
Use whichever is in front of you
In the app: attach the quote
Add the PDF or photo to a line in the UNSTAGED budget and it reads the total off the document and notes what it found. You confirm, and the line moves from planned to quoted.
In Claude or ChatGPT: paste the email
With your wedding connected, paste the vendor's email and ask it to add the quote to the budget and say what it covers. It files the number and lists what is in and what is not.
What to check by hand
Thirty seconds per quote
The total, against the page
Look at the number it read and the number on the document. When a quote has options or packages, tell it which one you chose.
Tax and service charge
The two lines most often left out of the first figure. Ask “is service included?” every time.
Deposit and balance dates
Put them in with the quote, so “what do we still have to pay, and when” has an answer.
What is not included
Delivery, setup, overtime, travel. Ask the assistant to list what the quote leaves out.
Let it read the number. Never let it choose the number. Which quote you accept is a decision; typing it in is admin.
Keep the three columns
Planned, quoted, paid: the method from the guide to tracking wedding expenses still holds. AI only changes how fast the quoted column fills. The day a quote arrives it is in the budget, and the total you look at is the real cost of the wedding as it stands, not the one you hoped for in month one. When a line goes over, the rule is unchanged: another line comes down or the contingency takes it, and the two of you decide which.
The quote reading lives in the budget in UNSTAGED, and connecting Claude or ChatGPT is explained on the Connect page.
The quote goes in the day it arrives, read by a machine and checked by you in thirty seconds. That habit is worth more than any budget template.
— The UNSTAGED Studio
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