Overview

Invoices are perhaps the most important part of any business. It’s how you get paid for the work you do. All accounting systems have their own terminology. Invoices are often referred to as a Sale. Regardless of what you normally call them, within Beeswax, anything that is income related should be entered as an Invoice.

In Beeswax there are a few ways you can create an invoice. Which way you choose will depend on the type of business you run and also how you run it.

Invoices can be created in the following ways:

1. Manually. This is where you build an Invoice from the ground up. Adding each line item one at a time.
2. Generated from Closed Tasks. In this case time logged against a Closed Task can be invoiced.
3. You can load the contents of an Invoice from a Template
4. Duplicated from another Invoice.
5. Convert a Quote into an Invoice

While you can create as many invoices as you like within a Project you generally create them once a Project has been completed. Of course there are times when you may wish to generate them before you start a Project, such as in the case of a deposit or to cover any initial projects costs. You may generate installment Invoices during the course of a Project if it is a long running one. This will be up to you and how you run your business.

Just remember that invoices are simply the things you create to record a Sale or Income. Everything that is income related should be generated as an Invoice. Even something like interest that you receive from your Bank, which is considered income, should be entered as an Invoice.

Invoices exist under a Project, have a states like Draft, Finalised and Paid and you monitor what is outstanding via the Who Owes Me report.

We suggest running a general admin Project that correlates to your tax reporting period as this gives you the ability to monitor and track miscellaneous income (and expenses) for that period. You'll be able to locate and track quickly and it's nice to consolidate a dedicated project where internal administrative activity can be managed like a Project. This instill a certain discipline to your day to day operations.

All financial documents: Invoice, Quotes and Expenses, are colour coded so that you can see immediately what type of document you are in.

Invoices, of course, are GREEN. So there is not mistaking what type of document you are working on.

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Invoice States…how do they work?

Invoices follow a specific flow and have the states shown below. Each state determines:

1. What can be edited
2. When accounts will be impacted (subject to which accounting method you are using: Cash or Accruals)
3. When a Payment can be applied
4. When it appears in the Who Owes Me report

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Let’s look at each state…

Invoices start in the Draft state, which means:

1. You can update and change anything without impacting your accounts.
2. You can’t apply a payment yet
3. The line Item do not impact your accounts. In other words, your General Ledger is not affected.
4. You can’t send it as an PDF just yet (via the Beeswax emailing system)
5. You can’t schedule it.

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Invoices then move to a Finalised state, which means:

1. The Invoice gets assigned an ID (this can be changed if needed. It is based on the Next Number sequence managed under Settings)
2. A Payment can be applied.
3. If you are using the Accrual accounting method then the transactions will appear on your General Ledger report. In other words, your accounts are affected.
4. You can send it as a PDF attachment in an email using the Beeswax system
5. You can download a PDF
6. You can schedule it.

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You then send an Invoice

When you send an Invoice to a Client the state gets moved to the Sent state. This indicates that the you have actually sent the Invoice via the Beeswax system.

By sending the Invoice via the Beeswax system  (as opposed to downloading a PDF and emailing it using your personal email) the activity is recorded in the Project Activities.

Here you’ll be able to see:

1. When it was sent (Sent Date)
2. Who sent it (User)
3. The recipients (email to)
4. As well as the message that was  included when it was sent.

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Sometimes you need to Resend an Invoice

If you resend an Invoice then the status will be set to Resent. There might be a number of reasons why you need to resend an Invoice, such as:

1. Your Client deleted it (accidently of course!)
2. Your Client doesn’t believe it was ever sent (it’s gone into Junk and they can’t find it)
3. It needs to be sent to someone else within their business, such as their accounts department or accounts person, or
4. The Invoice is overdue and you (or in most cases your bookkeeper) is chasing up payment.

The Invoice status will remain in the Resent state until a payment is made.

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Payment is made to an invoice

When a payment is made against the Invoice the state will show one of the following:

1. Part Paid or
2. Paid:

This is pretty self explanatory. Sometimes an invoice isn’t paid in full in which case you will see the Part Paid state.

There could be several Payments made to an Invoice and only when it is paid in full will it move to the following state of Paid.

The Invoice will move to the Paid state when it is fully paid. That is when the total payments equals the total amount of the Invoice.