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Earlier billing procedure

Current screen: AR Billing.

Purpose

For office staff who close transactions, review invoices, and send invoices or documents to customers and to the accounts system.

Before you start

  • You have the right account for this screen (see Permissions and Access).
  • The date and record you are working on are correct.
  • Words you do not know are in the Glossary.

Access

Accounting → AR Billing Accounting → Billing Presets Accounting → Trucking & Transload and the other payables and receivables lists

Screen

The billing screens carry no single screenshot. Each list is reached from Accounting.

Steps

Five Separate Jobs

Finishing one of these never means another is finished.

# The job
1 Closing a transaction in our system
2 Creating the invoice
3 Sending the invoice to the accounts system
4 Attaching a file to the transaction
5 Sending the email

A transaction marked closed does not mean the invoice reached the accounts system. An invoice marked sent does not mean the email left. Check each one where it actually happens.

Before You Do Anything

  • Check you are on the correct company account. This is the most common and most expensive mistake.
  • Check the operating date and the customer or vendor.
  • Note the reference — invoice number, order number, scale ticket — so you can find the same record again.
  • Decide whether this action changes only our system or also sends something outside.
  • If a result was unclear, open the outside system and look before repeating anything.

Close a Transaction

  1. Open the payables or receivables list you need.
  2. Check the company, source, reference, rates and amounts.
  3. Select only rows that should receive the same values.
  4. Check status, completion date, invoice or cheque number, and any remark.
  5. Submit once, then refresh and check every row you selected.

Review and Complete an Invoice

  1. Open Accounting → AR Billing. Filters apply as you set them; there is no Load button.
  2. Check the customer, the booking or container it came from, the source work, and whether an invoice already exists.
  3. Open Review and check every line: service, description, quantity, rate, amount.
  4. If an invoice number is needed it must be 21 characters or fewer. Then choose:
  5. Send each container — one accounts-system invoice per transaction, or
  6. Group same invoice # — only when the rows really do share one invoice number and one customer
  7. Select Complete, once.

Complete sends the invoice immediately. There is no separate "wait, then send" step. To send again later, use Send to QuickBooks on the completed row.

Apply Recurring Charges

Billing Presets applies to the whole batch you selected, in one go. If one row fails, none of the batch applies. After it succeeds, reread the transaction and its lines.

Fields

Field What it means
Company account Check this first. Everything else is worthless on the wrong account
Invoice number Must be 21 characters or fewer to be entered
Reference How you find the same record again
Recipient Who an email or invoice actually goes to

Status

Shown What it means What you do
READY The invoice exists here. Delivery is not finished Look at the send result
SYNCING A send is in progress Do not send again. Wait, then escalate if it never finishes
SYNCED The accounts system accepted it Compare its number with ours. Do not resend
SKIPPED Usually already sent Check the invoice it points to
ERROR The send failed. This does not prove the accounts system has no invoice See below

When the status is ERROR, or the result is unclear: search the accounts system first, by customer, invoice number and amount. If the invoice is there, do not resend — just make sure our record matches. Retry only after confirming it did not create one.

If some rows in a group went through and others did not, keep the ones that worked and escalate the rest. Retrying the whole group can duplicate invoices that already succeeded.

Notes

  • A completed row cannot be completed twice from the list, and an invoice already sent will not be overwritten.
  • When attaching a file, upload once, then reopen the transaction and open the file to confirm it opens. If a link is missing, check the stored file before uploading again. Before deleting a file, check whether another transaction uses it.
  • The test administrator account replaces the recipient with a test address — the customer will not receive it. Use your normal work account to send to a real customer.
  • After sending an email, check the Sent folder. Our screen saying "sent" is not proof.
  • The Local Invoice page is a separate job. Do not use it as proof that billing is done.