Create a sales invoice

You can create a sales invoice to:

  • Keep track of what your customers purchase.
  • See how much your clients owe you.
  • See when a payment is due.

You can choose to print the invoice and send it to your customer or email it to them directly.

When you receive a payment from a customer, you can record the payment against the invoice.

Before you start

Before you can create an invoice, you need to create a contact record.

If you supply your customers with the same products or services, you can save them as records.

Using stock items with sales invoices

Creating a sales invoice reduces the amount in stock

We track your stock by recording stock movements each time a stock is bought and sold. Whenever you record a sales invoice that includes a stock item, a 'Goods out' transaction is tracked and we automatically reduce your stock levels for this item.

We won't allow your stock levels to go into a negative value

So you can't sell something that's out of stock, we won't let you save an invoice when your stock levels are too low.

We recommend that you save the invoice as a draft until you've recorded all of your purchase transactions. If you need to, you can manually adjust your stock levels to change the number of items you have in stock.

Create a sales invoice

  1. Hover over Sales in the navigation bar, then select Sales Invoice, New Invoice.
  2. Complete the mandatory fields marked by an *.
  1. Record the sale of a specific product or service, in the Product/Service box. Select the product or service from the drop down list or type the name of the item and then select it or create a new one by selecting Create item.
    If the item has multiple price points, you can choose one by selecting the Price/Rate box.
  1. If you've created transaction analysis types, for example departments, select the ellipsis (3 dots) and choose the relevant category.
  2. The overall net amount of the invoice and tax total appear at the bottom of the invoice. To view a breakdown of the tax calculated, select 'Total tax'.
  3. Drafts or pro forma invoices can be used to create quotes and calculate shipping without generating an invoice number.
    To save the invoice as a draft or pro forma, select the 'Save as' check box and choose a format option from the drop-down menu.
    Drafts and pro forma invoices do not update your accounts until you convert them.

Charging customers for postage

If you want to charge your customer for postage, enter the net amount in the Shipping box.

Attachments

If you want to attach a file such as a copy of a receipt or a purchase order, select the attachment icon and then Upload files.

Reorder invoice lines

Once you added lines on your invoice, just choose the Reorder lines link to change the order they are printed on your invoice. You'll need to save the invoice as a draft first.

  1. Select the Reorder lines link.

  2. Choose to save the invoices as a draft.

  3. Use the icon in the Reorder column to drag and drop the lines to the required order.

  4. Select Apply. This takes you back to the invoice with the lines in your chosen order.

  5. To save the invoice ready to send to your customer and update your accounts, clear the Draft check box and then choose Save or Save and email.

What happens next?

The details of the sales invoice will now appear on the customer's activity. 

You can now:

  • record payment against the invoice
  • allocate a credit note to the invoice
  • email the invoice to a client
  • edit the invoice

Track your sales invoice

To help you manage and keep track of the sales invoices you create, you can view details such as when you created the invoice if you emailed or printed it and when the invoice was paid.

You can only view the document timeline in sales invoices created after 01/03/2019.

  1. Go to Sales and select Sales Invoices.
  2. Select an existing invoice created after 01/03/2019.

Hover over the following options to view the details:
StatusDetails
CreatedShows the date and time you created the invoice.
SentSent as PDF – Shows as manually submitted. If you then email the invoice, it will change to emailed.
Emailed – Shows the customer’s email address or addresses and the date and time you sent the email for all email addresses in the To and CC lines of the email.
Green – shows when at least one of the emails have sent.
Red – If one email fails to deliver.
You may need to refresh this page to update this status.
ViewedShows the email address and date when the customer viewed the email.
If tracking is important, you can clear the Include attachment check box in the email window.
If your customer’s email provider doesn’t confirm when they view emails, the Viewed status doesn’t update. This means your customer may have viewed the sales invoice even if the status hasn’t changed.
To use the viewed status, you must email the invoice when you create the invoice or when you click into the individual invoice. It is not possible to track the viewed status if you email it from the Sales Invoices page.
PaidShows the date of the last payment recorded on the sales invoice.
Green – If fully paid.
Light Orange – If part paid.
Dark Orange – If it is overdue.

To manage an existing invoice

Go to Sales, Sales Invoices, and then select the required invoice.

From here you can:

View the invoice details. This includes whether it’s paid or unpaid.
Check if the invoice has been issued. The invoice shows as issued if you’ve emailed or printed the invoice.
Email the invoice. You can send your invoice to your customer as a PDF file attachment.
Copy the existing invoice. This creates a new invoice with the exact same details without having to re-enter the information.
Edit the existing invoice. If the invoice has already been paid, credited or included on a Tax Return, you can’t amend it. For more information, please see To edit or void a sales invoice.
Pay an invoice. Record a payment against the invoice.
Create a credit note. Use the More option to quickly create a credit note with the same details as the invoice.
Print a delivery note. Use the More option to print a delivery note for the invoice.

To view a breakdown of payments and allocations

You can easily view which receipts have paid off your sales invoices, as well as which invoices and credit notes have been allocated together.

  1. Locate and open the invoice or credit note from the activity section on the contact record or, from the Sales tab.
  2. Click the Amount Paid value.

The Payments and Allocations option appears.

The allocation details of the transaction appears here, depending on the type of transaction you originally opened. To view further details, click the value in the Amount column.

To convert a draft or pro forma invoice

  1. Go to Sales, Sales Invoices.
  2. Click the required invoice. Amend any details on the invoice as necessary.
  3. Clear the Save as check box.
  4. Click one of the following options:
  • Save – Saves and closes the invoice.
  • Save & Email – Amend the text as required then click Send.
  • Save & Print – Depending on your browser, the invoice opens in a new window or tab and you can print it from your browser menu.
  • Save & New – Saves and closes this invoice and you can then create a new invoice.

The invoice is converted to an invoice and the value appears on the relevant nominal ledger accounts.

Customizing sales invoices

You can use the Customize menu at the bottom of the New Sales Invoice page to jump to customization settings. This saves you time when trying to customize invoices for your business. You can also preview it by selecting Preview document from the New Sales Invoice page.

customize invoices