This chapter describes the process of entering invoices manually. The flowchart illustrates the steps in the process and the matching functionality in Exact Financials. This chapter also describes the steps for entering invoices in foreign currencies.
The proposal phase, which contains the price negotiation will result in a contract and an order. The invoice is the final result of the sales process and leads to the company revenue. When a customer is not registered as a debtor, you need to record the data before you enter the invoice.
Businesses with a fixed product range often work with standard items. However, when a business sells a product or perform services that varies all the time and for which no fixed item description and data are available, this will require another method of invoicing.
In Exact Sales, you can create invoices in [Sales: Processes, Sales invoices, Sales invoice entry]. An invoice consists of an invoice header and invoice lines. The invoice header contains the general debtor data. The invoice lines contain the items and costs that have to be invoiced. The fields and the ability to change them depends on your settings in [Sales: File, Company settings, Sales settings].
The invoicing method that will be used depends on the product range:
Text lines
The length of the text lines has to be defined in the layout. The length of the text lines can be defined in [Sales: File, Company settings, Sales settings]. Text lines can be used for two purposes:
Before you enter an invoice, you should check whether the following data are registered correctly:
An invoice debtor is the debtor that will be invoiced and eventually settle the payment for the outstanding items. This debtor does not have to be the same person or company that receives the goods or the person or company that placed the order. Especially in companies with several branches and in businesses that work with agents, it is very important to separate debtor, delivery debtor and invoice debtor.
The delivery debtor is the debtor that will receive the goods. It is important that the data of the delivery debtor are recorded accurately in order to deliver the goods at the correct address.
The credit line is the maximum outstanding amount that a debtor is allowed to have in your company. It is important to arrange clear agreements with regard to this sale condition for your debtor management. The credit line is a useful tool to determine whether your debtor can place an order and to determine the maximum invoice amount. Inform your debtors of their credit lines beforehand as well as when the debtors are going to reach their limits.
The payment conditions are an important part of the payment agreements because they can influence the payment habit of the debtor. Enter the payment conditions you agreed on with your debtor. There are two kinds of payment conditions:
You should link payment conditions to a debtor, when you create the debtor. The conditions should be checked before or while entering the invoice, to prevent an invoice being sent with the wrong payment charge or discount.
Price negotiations take place in the negotiation phase. Once an agreement has been made an order is placed and the sale is concluded. Existing price/discount agreements have to be registered in the system per debtor in order to use the correct discounts. The agreements are not only valid for this sale but also for future sales. The agreed prices are often recorded in price lists.
Price lists are used for quantity discounts or for groups of debtors. When you enter an invoice, you should check whether the correct price list is linked to a debtor to prevent invoices with the wrong discount or with no discount at all from being sent. Enter the number of an item or an item group and the accompanying discount type (amount, percentage or new price) in the menu paths: [Sales: Master data, Maintenance, Price lists, Price list codes], [Sales: Master data, Maintenance, Price lists, Price lists per item group] and [Sales: Master data, Maintenance, Price lists, Price lists per item]. A debtor can only be linked to one price list, one price list can be linked to several debtors. The linking of a price list to a debtor provides the automatic use of the correct discount. The discount is calculated in the invoice lines. If you want to use different discounts, you can use a different price list in every invoice line.
Some companies use one price list for one particular debtor. If you want to use more than one price list for a debtor and you do not want to change the price list for every invoice line, you can make a price list in which all relevant discounts for a debtor are recorded. If you record all this data in one list, no discounts can be overlooked and it is not necessary to change the price list.
You can also enter discounts in the following ways:
If you have foreign customers, you have the possibility to enter invoices in foreign currencies. Before you enter an order, you should check whether the currency is registered in your system and whether the current exchange rate is correct. In your debtor master data, you will have to link a default currency to a debtor. If you want to be able to enter orders for a particular debtor in a currency other than the default currency, you need to select the 'Change debtor data' check box on the 'General' tab in [Sales: File, Company settings, Sales settings].
The debtor data such as the name, address and other fixed data have to be reviewed and updated from time to time. It would be risky to assume that the data is entered correctly or that it never changes. If you want to be able to change the debtor data, you need to select the 'Change debtor data' check box on the 'General' tab in [Sales: File, Company settings, Sales settings]. The advantages of recording fixed debtor data are:
Several reports in Exact Sales are available to allow you to see what you have in stock.
The VAT data needs to be checked whenever you enter a debtor or an invoice. A VAT code is often linked to a debtor or an item to prevent that an incorrect VAT percentage will be assigned to the goods.
Example
Belgian customers do not pay any VAT when they purchase goods in The Netherlands. Belgian debtors need to be recorded with a VAT of 0%.
In certain cases the entity who delivers the goods or services is not the entity who transfers the VAT, but this is done by the entity that purchases the goods or services. The VAT is charged to the buyer. You are able to record this in the data of the debtors involved.
Frequent checking of data mentioned above makes your debtor maintenance a lot easier. This simplifies the collection of outstanding items, because you do not have to look for the appropriate data and invoice conditions.
In Exact Financials, you can link VAT codes to debtors in [Finance: Debtors, Master data, Maintenance] and to items in [Sales: Master data, Maintenance, Items, Items] after creating them in [Finance: Ledger, VAT, Master data, Maintenance, VAT codes].
If you use 'VAT charged', you have to select the 'VAT charged' check box on the 'General' tab in [Finance: Ledger, VAT, Master data, Maintenance, VAT codes]. In order to charge the VAT to the buyer, you have to link the appropriate VAT link to the debtor or to the item.
An invoice entered is not immediately processed and completed. The details of the invoices that have not been printed in the final form can still be modified. After entry, the invoice will be transferred to the person/department that is responsible for checking and approving the invoice. In most cases this will not be the person/department that entered the invoice. You can use trial copies of the invoices to check invoices. After approval, the invoice will be printed and it cannot be changed anymore.
Recurring invoices serve as templates for sales invoices that are frequently created and processed on a weekly, monthly, quarterly or yearly basis, such as insurance premiums and loan repayment. You can create recurring sales invoices in [Sales: Processes, Recurring sales invoices, Entry]. You can create recurring invoices to save time from creating manual entries of similar invoices.
Recurring sales invoices that have been entered into the system can be generated as sales invoices in [Sales: Processes, Recurring sales invoices, Generate sales invoices]. These invoices can then be printed, process and then sent to the customers. See [Printing invoices] and [Processing invoices].