The recurring file-feed problem
Banks, suppliers, payroll bureaus, and legacy systems don't call APIs — they drop files. Usually on a schedule, usually onto SFTP, and usually in a format the next system can't use as-is. So somebody's job becomes: check the folder, download the file, clean it up, load it where it goes. Every day or every week, forever.
The work is completely rule-shaped — same file type, same fixes, same destination — which makes it the single best candidate for automation in most finance and ops teams.
The setup, step by step
- Set up your SFTP inbox. On Team plans and up, Morph provides an SFTP inbox — a secure folder your counterparties (or your own systems) can drop files into. No server to run yourself.
- Point the feed at the inbox. Give the bank, supplier, payroll bureau, or internal system the inbox credentials, or redirect an existing scheduled upload to it.
- Build the cleanup rule once. Define how each file type should be cleaned, mapped, and reshaped — the same no-code rules used everywhere in Morph.
- Attach a file-arrival trigger. Link the rule to the inbox. The moment a matching file lands, the rule runs — instantly, server-side, with no one logged in.
- Deliver and monitor. The cleaned output lands in your inbox's outputs folder — retrievable over the same SFTP connection — and can also be delivered to Google Drive or downloaded as CSV. Failed runs are flagged, the original file is kept, and failures never count against your syncs.
How file-arrival triggers compare to schedules
Scheduled runs (daily on Starter, hourly on Pro and up) fit data you pull — a nightly Xero export, for instance. File-arrival triggers fit data that arrives on someone else's clock: the trigger fires when the file lands, however irregular the sender is. Both run server-side with no one logged in, and both follow the same rule — only successful runs count, failed runs are always free.
See pricing for which plans include which triggers, or the integrations overview for everything the cleaned output can be delivered to.