How to Convert American Express Statements to Excel and CSV

American Express has one of the better native data export tools of any card issuer. From the Amex online portal, you can download your transaction history in several formats, including CSV, Excel (.xlsx), Quicken (.qfx), QuickBooks (.qbo), and OFX, without any third-party conversion needed.

That does not mean you will never need to convert an Amex PDF. There are situations where the PDF is the right source, whether you are working with very old statements, dealing with a format your accounting tool does not accept, or need to process a PDF someone else sent you.

Option 1: Download directly from Amex (preferred for most cases)

1. Log in at americanexpress.com and navigate to the card account you want.
2. Click on Statements and Activity (or "Account Activity") in the navigation.
3. Look for the Download button near the top of the transaction list or near the statement summary.
4. Select the date range (or a specific statement period) and choose your format:
   • CSV for Excel and Google Sheets
   • Excel (.xlsx) if you want to open directly in Excel without the import wizard
   • Quicken (.qfx) for Quicken
   • QuickBooks (.qbo) for QuickBooks Online
   • OFX for Xero and other OFX-compatible tools
5. Click Download.

American Express provides up to 7 years of statement history in its online portal. You can download custom date ranges or entire statement periods.

Understanding Amex's export format

The Amex CSV export includes Date, Description, Amount, Extended Details, and Card Member Name (useful for corporate accounts with multiple authorized users). Amounts are positive for charges and negative for payments and credits, following the credit card accounting convention.

Amex's CSV uses US date format (MM/DD/YYYY) regardless of your regional settings. If you are importing into a tool that expects a different format (Xero with UK settings, for example), you may need to reformat the date column.

Option 2: Download and convert Amex PDF statements

Amex PDF statements are accessible through Statements and Activity > View Statements. Select the statement period and click the PDF download button.

Amex PDF statements are more detailed than the CSV export. They include payment due dates, minimum payment information, rewards point summaries, and merchant category information for each transaction.

To convert an Amex PDF to CSV, upload it to Statement Pro's American Express converter. Amex PDFs have a consistent format that converts cleanly. The output CSV will have Date, Description, and Amount columns.

Business vs. personal Amex accounts

Amex personal and business cards are both accessible through americanexpress.com. Business cardholders with multiple employee cards will see a Card Member column in the download, which identifies which authorized user made each transaction. This is useful for expense reporting but may require some cleanup when importing into a general ledger.

Importing into Excel

If you downloaded the Excel (.xlsx) format from Amex, just open the file directly. If you downloaded the CSV, use Data > From Text/CSV in Excel for the most reliable import. Set the delimiter to comma and confirm that the Date column is formatted as Date after import.

Importing into QuickBooks Online

Use the QBO format from Amex's native download for the cleanest QuickBooks import. Go to Transactions > Bank Transactions > File Upload, select your Amex account in QuickBooks, and upload the QBO file. No column mapping needed.

Importing into Xero

Use the OFX download from Amex for Xero. In Xero, go to Accounting > Bank Accounts, select your Amex account, and click Import a Statement. If you use CSV instead, Xero expects Date, Payee, Description, and Amount columns, with positive amounts for payments you made to your Amex account and negative for charges.

Working with Amex rewards and category data

Amex's CSV export includes an Extended Details column that sometimes contains merchant category information and rewards point data. This column is not standardized and will not import cleanly into most accounting tools. It is safe to delete that column from your CSV before importing if it causes issues.

For general PDF-to-CSV guidance, see How to Convert PDF to CSV. For a full import guide covering QuickBooks and Xero, see Bank Statement to CSV and Excel: The Complete Guide.