Smart Receipts: Unusable app due to intrusive ads
Users are frustrated with the intrusive ads in apps they have paid for, which significantly degrade usability and functionality. This issue is compounded by the loss of important data, leading to a sense of wasted investment and dissatisfaction with the service.
7 different people have complained about this since 24 Feb 2022, most recently on 22 Oct 2025.
- “Smart Receipts: Expenses & Tax — Ads often making app literally unusable.”
- “Very disappointed with what was previously quite a usable app.”
- “So all I spent on has essentially gone out in the window as I have ads on my app again.”
7 people in 7 posts across 1 source · demand low, pain low, competition low
The pain
shares of 7 quoted postsWhat goes wrong, and for whom
- Who
- 7 people using Smart Receipts: Expenses & Tax
- What goes wrong
- Not classified into a failure type — read the posts below.
- How bad
- 57% of posts are complaints
- Since
- 24 Feb 2022 → 22 Oct 2025
Is this a startup idea?
Not directly. These are complaints about a product or service people already use — the fix belongs first to that provider.
- Complaints are about
- Smart Receipts: Expenses & Tax
- Looking for something else
- 0% want an alternative · 43% ask the provider for a feature
- What the numbers say
- Almost nobody is looking for a different product — people want this provider to fix it, not a new option.
The pain — what people say
Their asks, who is writing, and the posts themselves
What people were doing
Every post behind this page, by what its author was doing — and when each one was written
- Complaint457%
- Request343%
Sources
7 signals · 1 sources
Evidence
Raw public posts behind this opportunity — click through to the original. 1 post was held back as off-topic; all 7 still count toward the score.
Smart Receipts: Expenses & Tax — Ads often making app literally unusable I don’t have a problem with the use of ads to support the development of this app. However, I’m often having to force quit the app when a full screen ad appears and does not go away on its own or allow some means of dismissing it. Even the “x” to…
…totally ignored. Subscription cancelled and alternative app bought. Very disappointed with what was previously quite a usable app. ADDENDUM - reference the developer response to review above. I DID email support and you did NOT respond. .
…t year (which was around $30) and now they have new premium versions. So all I spent on has essentially gone out in the window as I have ads on my app again. Happy to update my review if the issue is resolved.
…n October ‘24 I updated to the $99 subscription & it’s been hopeless. Seem to have lost 5 months of work receipts. Reached out for support but it’s been really inadequate.
Smart Receipts: Expenses & Tax — Sort the ads Sick of the ads you cannot shut down without going right back out and back in
Market and score
Products already there, how the score moved, and what it is made of
Opportunity history
Every score change is stored as a snapshot — click a sub-score to overlay it
Why did it move?
Score 25.2 → 25.7 · 30 Sept 2026, 19:00 → 20:15 UTC
How the score was measured38 measured values behind the seven sub-scores · each shows the value, then the points it earned out of 100Show ↓Hide ↑
Questions about this idea
- Is Unusable app due to intrusive ads a startup idea?
- Not directly. These are complaints about a product or service people already use, and the fix belongs first to that provider. The page shows what is frustrating users and how badly — not an open market to start a company in.
- How many people have this problem?
- 7 different people described it independently, in 7 mentions, the earliest from 24 Feb 2022 and the most recent from 22 Oct 2025. The quotes, with dates and links to the originals, are in the Evidence section.
- Is this problem getting worse?
- Current status: stable — mentioned at a steady rate. Momentum is 43/100, measured as how often it is mentioned recently compared with before.
Adjacent opportunities
Nearest neighbours by embedding similarity
Have you run into this?
Written by readers, except comments marked Team, which are ours. Not part of the evidence above and not counted in any score.
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