Receipts and Payments

Which kind of money

Choosing the wrong kind is the commonest mistake on this page. + Enter receipt and + Enter payment first ask What kind of payment is this? (or receipt): Single entry, Split entry (compound) or Transfer between your accounts.

Record a direct payment

A direct receipt is the same, with + Enter receipt, an Income category and Deposit to.

Halfway through and it turns out to be more than one thing? Several accounts in one payment? Split it takes what you typed to the split screen. Money moved between your own accounts? Record a transfer (contra entry) takes it to the transfer screen instead.

If the Method you choose on a receipt has a deposit account (set under Settings › Payment methods), Deposit to fills in with it and says which method it came from. Once you choose the account yourself, changing the method leaves it alone.

Record money against invoices or bills

The receipt's Applied to table shows, for each invoice, the Invoice total, what had Already paid before this payment, what this payment Applied, and the Balance left after it. The three add up to the invoice total, so whoever holds the receipt can check it. They are the figures as at this receipt and do not change afterwards: a receipt for a 5,000 part payment against a 25,000 invoice still says 20,000 was left, however much has been paid since.

Record a split payment (a compound entry)

One sum paid from one account to one payee, but for several things: the bank shows it once and you reconcile it once, so it is one payment with several lines — what QuickBooks calls a split and an accountant a compound entry (an entry with more than one debit or more than one credit).

It posts, for a payment: debit each line's account by its amount before VAT, debit Input VAT by the VAT on the lines, credit the bank by the total. A receipt is the other way round, crediting each line and Output VAT. A Reverse charge or Import line on a payment is always the net, and its VAT is self-assessed beside it (debit Input VAT, credit Output VAT) and not paid to the bank.

Each line posts with its own tags, so Profit & Loss and General Ledger filtered by a project or branch include it. The bank line carries no tag.

A split receipt is the same with + Enter receipt › Split entry (compound). Its printed receipt (Print receipt, Download receipt, Email receipt) lists the lines under Received for, each with its VAT, so the customer sees what the money was for. A split settles no invoice or bill, so it is never money on a customer's account and cannot be refunded from here. The list shows it as Split · 3 lines, and opening it shows each line.

To correct one, press Edit: the split screen opens with its lines, asks for a Reason for the correction, and records the corrected payment under a new number, like any correction. A single direct payment can be corrected into a split with Split this payment across several accounts.

An asset a split payment bought stays with its line through a correction — Asset FA-… stays on the register — keeping its number; a changed amount changes its cost. Remove takes it off that line, and saving then takes the asset off the register. Both are refused once the asset has depreciation, additions or a disposal: correct those first. Deleting the payment takes its assets off the register the same way. A single payment that bought an asset can be split and keeps it on its first line.

Money between your own accounts

Money from the bank to petty cash, between two banks, or paying off the company card is a transfer — a contra entry — not a payment: no one outside the company was paid, nothing was earned or spent. Press + Transfer money, or choose Transfer between your accounts when asked what kind of payment it is. The transfer, its bank charges, revisions and log are described in Bank Accounts › Transfers between your accounts.

The Transfers between accounts tab beside Receipts & payments lists them, following the Account filter above it.

Buying equipment with a direct payment

The cost goes to the category's fixed asset account instead of an expense, and the asset appears on the register linked to the payment — one entry, posted once.

Finding transactions

• Search matches the contact, number, reference or memo — or an amount: type 1,250 to find every receipt or payment of exactly that amount.
• Sort: Newest first (the default), Oldest first, by amount or by number.
• Account narrows to one bank or cash account; From and To narrow the dates.
• Money movement: Receipts and Payments, Receipts or Payments.
• Show: Active transactions, Removed / replaced (what was deleted or edited) or All history.
• Under the account, each receipt or payment says what it went on: the invoice or bill numbers; On account when none of it is applied to an invoice or a bill yet — a deposit taken before there was an invoice, say; Part on account when some of it is; Applied to invoices (or Applied to bills) when all of it is; or Refund PAY-… where some was given back. A refund itself reads Refund of RCT-…. A direct one names its category.
• Open a transaction to View, Edit or Delete it, and to Print receipt or Download receipt. Copy enters it again as a new one; see Enter one again: Copy.
• What was changed in each edit or delete, why and by whom is listed under Reports › Modification Register.
• Transfers between your own accounts are on the Transfers between accounts tab, not in this list.

Enter one again: Copy

This month's rent, the usual supplier paid the usual way: Copy beside a receipt or a payment opens the form it was entered on with everything as it was, so you change what differs and save. The same button is inside an open transaction, as Copy this receipt or Copy this payment. What you save is a new entry with its own number; the original is not touched. It records, it does not correct, so it needs only Record payments.

• The Date is today, never the original's. A note at the top says Copied from PAY-00012 and lists anything the copy could not bring with it.
• The contact, account, amount, method, Reference, Memo, category, service charge and VAT are the original's. Check the Reference: a cheque or transfer number belongs to one payment.
• A copy of money against invoices or bills keeps the customer or supplier and the amount, but not what the original was applied to: choose what this one pays, or keep it on account.
• A payment that bought equipment — ticked Add this purchase to the fixed asset register, or Fixed asset on a split line — registers a new asset like the original's when you save: the same class, name and depreciation, with the serial number left blank. Change opens it and Remove takes it off. Without Manage assets the copy leaves the asset out and asks for an expense account instead.
• Attached files stay with the original. An account that has been closed, or a card clearing account, is left blank for you to choose; so is a category, method or VAT treatment no longer in use.
• A refund is not copied: money is given back from its own receipt with Refund.

Refund money on account

Money a customer paid that is not applied to any invoice — a deposit for a booking that was cancelled, an overpayment — can be given back to them from here.

It posts: debit Accounts Receivable (the customer), credit the bank, in the payment series. It appears under Payments, as Refund on the customer's statement, and on the bank ledger for reconciling, and the receipt's money on account falls by it. The receipt shows what was refunded from it, and the aged receivables count only what is still on account.

• Money applied to an invoice needs a credit note first.
• A receipt with a refund cannot be deleted or edited until the refund is deleted. A refund is changed by deleting it and refunding again; deleting it puts the money back on the customer's account.
• A direct receipt (income with no invoice behind it) cannot be refunded here, nor can a refund itself, and a refund cannot settle a bill or an invoice. The refund keeps to the closed periods and the lock date like any payment.
• Transportation gives back a job's deposit the same way, from the job's Money.

Editing and deleting

Editing a recorded transaction asks for a Reason for edit; deleting asks for a reason too. Neither rewrites history: the original entry is reversed and, for an edit, the corrected one posted. Both stay under Show › Removed / replaced. A corrected receipt keeps a link to the one that replaced it.

The original and its reversal cancel each other out, so account statements and the General Ledger leave both out: after an edit only the corrected transaction shows, and after a delete nothing does. The Modification Register keeps the record of what changed.

Example