Accounts payable tracking in Excel works well for small businesses that don't need the full overhead of AP automation software. The goal is simple: know what you owe, to whom, and when it's due — and flag anything that's about to be late.
Your AP Log
One row per bill. Columns: vendor name, invoice number, invoice date, due date, amount, payment terms (Net 30, Net 60, etc.), status (Unpaid, Partial, Paid), amount paid, and balance due.
Balance due:
=F2-H2
Where F2 is the invoice amount and H2 is the amount paid. This auto-calculates even for partial payments.
Flagging Upcoming and Overdue Payments
Add a Days Until Due column:
=D2-TODAY()
Apply conditional formatting: red if negative (overdue), amber if 0-7 days, green if 8+. Apply only to rows where status is not Paid.
Add an Overdue column:
=IF(AND(D2<TODAY(), I2<>"Paid"), "OVERDUE", "")
Cash Requirements by Week
Use SUMIFS to calculate how much needs to be paid each week:
=SUMIFS(I:I, D:D, ">="&TODAY(), D:D, "<="&TODAY()+7, J:J, "<>Paid")
Where I is balance due, D is due date, and J is status. Do this for the current week, next week, and the week after. This tells your finance team how much cash to have available in each window.
Vendor Summary
Build a pivot table showing total outstanding AP by vendor. Add Vendor to Rows and Balance Due to Values (SUM). Sort descending to see your largest outstanding liabilities. This is what your CFO wants to see at month end.
The Easy Way: Using SheetXAI in Excel
Example 1: You have bill data already in the spreadsheet.
"I have an AP log on Sheet 1 with vendor, invoice date, due date, amount, and payment status. Add balance due calculations, flag overdue and upcoming payments, and build a weekly cash requirement summary and vendor balance summary."
SheetXAI reads your data, adds the calculated columns, applies the flags, and builds both summaries.
Example 2: Your bills are in your accounting software.
"Pull outstanding bills from QuickBooks and build an AP tracker showing what's due this week, next week, and overdue, with a vendor balance summary."
SheetXAI connects to QuickBooks and builds the full AP tracker.
Try SheetXAI free and see what it builds for you.
Published May 2026. See also: How to Build a Profit and Loss Report in Google Sheets, How to Do a Bank Reconciliation in Google Sheets, and Google Sheets AI Guide.
