How to find a receipt: email, shop accounts and lost copies

Start with how you bought the item: an online order, an app order or a purchase at a till. That tells you whether to look in email, your shop account or a retailer’s receipt lookup. A bank transaction can help you identify the date and amount, but it usually does not list the items.

Choose the shop or app

• Flybuys and Coles receipts — where to look for your Coles shop.
• Woolworths receipts — eReceipts in Everyday Rewards and missing shops.
• Walmart receipts — app purchase history and the store receipt lookup.
• Zara receipts — saved purchases, guest orders and a lost store receipt.
• Amazon receipts and invoices — finding the order and saving its document.
• American Airlines receipts — ticket receipts and separate onboard purchases.
• Fetch receipt history — finding a receipt you already submitted.
• McDonald’s app receipts — email, restaurant help and country differences.

If you expect an email receipt

1. Search the mailbox used at checkout for the shop name. Include Archive and Spam, and check another account if someone else placed the order.
2. Try the order number if you have it. A narrow search for “receipt” can miss a message called “your order” or “invoice”.
3. Start around the purchase date, then widen the range: the confirmation, dispatch message and final receipt can arrive separately.

The free email receipt finder prepares searches for Gmail and Outlook, with guided searches for Yahoo and iCloud. You run the search in your own mailbox; no signup or inbox connection is needed.

If you only have a bank transaction

Write down the merchant, amount and approximate purchase date. Check which household member or work account made the purchase before asking the retailer for a copy. Where the retailer offers an official card lookup, enter payment details there.

For a shop enquiry, prepare the location, date, approximate time, total and items purchased. Ask: “Can you retrieve an itemised copy of this purchase?” Recovery depends on the retailer’s records; creating a new account does not guarantee that an old transaction will appear.

Check the document before saving it

Open the file and check the seller, items, date and final total. Keep refund documents alongside it if the purchase changed. A booking confirmation, rewards balance or payment authorisation may help locate the purchase without being the final receipt you need.

Save the original PDF or email somewhere you can find again, using a name such as 2026-09-06-shop-receipt.pdf. If you use The Paper Keep, you can upload the recovered file or forward the receipt email. It cannot recover documents directly from a retailer’s account.