Café
A supplier says the price of milk is going up. You paste their email and your current price list, and ask for a polite reply that asks from when it applies and whether there is a fixed price for volume. You check the figures before sending.
Claude for office tasks: email, Excel, documents and meeting notes
Four tasks that come back every week in any office, with an example from a café, a gym, an architecture studio and an accountancy.
Before you start
We wrote the examples with accountancies, consultancies, architecture studios, gyms, cafés and content creators in mind, using tasks that repeat in those trades. They are ideas for use, not client cases, and they carry no figures for time saved because we have not measured that here.
The picture that helps most: Claude is a new, very fast intern who has read most of the internet. It drafts in seconds if you give it a clear brief. Where the picture stops working: an intern asks when in doubt, and Claude tends to assume. It does not know your clients or your prices unless you give them, and it can state a wrong figure with confidence. That is why every example has a checking step that you do.
Email: replying without starting from a blank page
Gym
A member asks to cancel. You give the text of your cancellation policy and ask for a reply that explains the notice period without sounding curt. You check that the period matches your contract.
Architecture studio
A client asks why the permit is taking so long. You paste the status of the file and ask for two versions, a short one and a more detailed one. You choose and confirm the dates.
Accountancy
Every quarter you ask your clients for the same things: invoices and statements. You give the list and ask for a reminder personalised for each client. You check who has already sent what.
Excel and spreadsheets: understanding and sorting data
Attach the file or paste a few rows and say what you want to see. Claude can create files on every plan. According to Anthropic's pricing page, Pro and above also connect with Microsoft 365; check its help center for what exactly it does inside Excel before you depend on it.
Café
You export the month's sales from the till and ask for them grouped by product, with what barely sells flagged. You check that the totals match your close.
Gym
You give the member list with join and leave dates and ask how many stayed less than three months. You check two or three cases by hand.
Architecture studio
You paste the hours for each project and ask for a summary by person and by phase. You check that no week is missing.
Accountancy
You hand over a bank statement and ask for a suggested category for each entry. You decide the final category and book it.
A rule for all of them: always ask it to explain how it reached the figure, and check a sample by hand.
Documents: drafts, summaries and review
Café
You give your recipes and allergens and ask for a one-page sheet for new staff. You check the allergens dish by dish.
Gym
You paste the house rules and ask for a half-page version for the notice board. You check that no rule has changed.
Architecture studio
You upload a project report and ask for a one-page summary for the client, without technical terms. You check measurements and deadlines.
Accountancy
You upload an information note from the tax authority and ask what changes for your self-employed clients. You check the original text before advising anyone.
Meeting notes: from jottings to minutes with tasks
Paste your unsorted notes and ask for minutes in three parts: decisions, tasks with an owner and open questions. If an owner or a date is missing, ask it to mark that instead of inventing one. Say so in the brief.
- Café: the weekly shift meeting, with who covers what.
- Gym: the meeting with the trainers about class times.
- Architecture studio: the site visit, with what each trade has to resolve.
- Accountancy: the call with a client, with the documents still missing.
You read the minutes and correct them before sending them to anyone.
How to give a good brief
The clearer the brief, the better the first draft, as with a freelancer. Include:
- Who the text is for and what tone you want.
- The data it should use: pasted or attached, not from memory.
- What to do if a piece of data is missing: ask, or leave it marked.
- The output format: email, table or list.
When you repeat a brief every week, save it as a Skill. Usage depends on the plan: see what each one costs.
If you want a printable list of 20 tasks like these, it is in Resources.
Frequently asked questions about Claude in the office
Which office tasks can Claude do?
Writing and answering emails, sorting and checking data in a spreadsheet, preparing or summarising documents and turning meeting notes into minutes with tasks. Always as a draft: a person checks names, figures and dates before anything leaves the company.
Do I need a paid plan?
The free plan is enough to start. It includes chat, file creation, memory and up to 5 projects. The paid plans give more usage and features such as delegating and scheduling tasks.
Can I paste my clients' data?
Before you do, check which plan you use and what its data settings are. On the Team plan, Anthropic says content is not used to train models by default. On the other plans, check your account settings, and if in doubt, remove names and personal data from the text.
Does it replace someone on the team?
It writes the draft, it does not decide. Someone still answers for the result: the person who sends the email, signs the quote or presents the figure.
Pick a task from your week and try it with us
In the Claude course we work with tasks from your own office. We also set Claude up for small teams. Course dates to be confirmed.