- Documentation status: 5.3.110
- From licence type: Accounting
- Module: Yes, please contact us in the support team if you are interested support@proadsoftware.com.
- Additional field: "Manual period total" available from version: 5.3.92
- Additional function: "Generate, post and download invoice(s)" available as of version: 5.3.92
- Additional functionalities: new tab "Runs performed", display of current runs and downloads available as of version: 6.0.430
Background
The “Recurring Invoices” module allows the regular billing of recurring outgoing invoices, such as “hosting fees”.
Requirements
To be able to use the serial invoice in PROAD, settings and defaults must be created in advance.
The numbering of the outgoing invoices
The numbering for invoices must be set to automatic number assignment!
With manual numbering, no outgoing invoices can be created and posted automatically. You can then create accounting modalities in a project, but the Serial Invoice dialogue will not open.
The quote for the serial invoice
To create recurring invoices, we need a project with an approved offer with at least one position.
The offer is the basis for the items to be invoiced. Open the project dialogue, switch to the tab "Quote" and create a quote.
You can release the quote via the function menu if no automatic release is set.
Switch to the item list and create all items that are to be settled later in the recurring invoice. You must create at least one item, as only offers with a net total greater than 0.00 can be settled.
With these prerequisites, the settlement types can now be entered.
Setup settlement types
In the project dialogue, switch to the tab settlement types. Here, you can define the serial invoice settings for this project.
If this tab is not displayed, right-click in the tab bar to open the tab configuration. If the tab Billing Modalities is on the left side, please move it to the visible tabs. If you cannot find the tab at all, please check the user group rights for your user group.
Settlement types
Set the settlement type to "Offer". The option "None" clears all fields and thus ends the serial settlement for this project.
Invoice template
So that the outgoing invoices can be created directly later, select the corresponding invoice template here
Quote
With this setting, you specify the appropriate quotation as the source for the outgoing invoices to be generated. All approved quotations with a net value other than 0.00 are displayed.
If the quote you have just created is not yet displayed in the selection list, please execute the function "Refresh" in the function menu of the project.
Regular cycle
The cycle determines the frequency with which the serial invoices are due. A distinction is made here whether the amount of the offer is settled in full or pro rata.
- Total monthly
- Total quarterly
- Total half-yearly
- Total annual
- Monthly1/12
- Quarterly 1/4
- Half-yearly 1/2
Key date
Here, you enter the day in the month on which the statements are to be created. If you enter the 31st as the key date here, the last day of the respective month is taken for months with fewer days (e.g. 28 February).
Service period
Depending on the determined invoice date and this setting, a performance period is generated for the corresponding document field of the document template.
Next due date
The next due date is set by the posting process. During posting, the next due date is determined on the basis of the last settlement date, the selected cycle and the set key date.
The next due date can also be changed manually. If you pre-record the settlement modalities and want to make the first settlement only in the future, you can enter a “first” due date here. This does not have to correspond to the due date, but can be set to a different day.
Offer sum
To facilitate the overview, the net bid amount is shown.
Calculated period total
Depending on the set cycle, the respective amount of the period is displayed.
Manual period total
If you enter a manual period total here, it will be used when creating the invoice and not the automatically calculated period total.
This value is a net value. Depending on the quotation basis, VAT may be added to the period total.
Create the recurring invoice
Open the dialogue Accounting > Serial Invoice, you are in the area "Runs carried out". Please switch to "Create" in the side area.
If you have entered the settlement modalities correctly, the project with the offer to be settled appears in the list. The list is displayed empty if you have entered a date in the future for the settlement modalities. In this case, you can change the due date (Due by).
The list shows all data that are due on the key date, i.e. all projects whose next settlement is before the key date.
Projects with the status "Settled" or "Cancelled" are no longer proposed for serial invoicing.
This list is a dialogue list: This means that you can set the display as well as the filtering and manage it as favourites. New columns can now be used here:
- The period total: the period total is determined from the net supply total on the basis of the cycle.
- The number of periods not settled: Based on the last settlement, the number of possible settlements is determined for the key date on the basis of the cycle.
- The sum of unaccounted periods: The amount from the product of the number and the period total is shown here. This gives you the amount that can be calculated in total.
Four functions are available in the function menu for processing the serial invoice.
- Open quote: With this function, you jump to the project offer dialogue of the selected data set.
- Create invoice: With this function, you create the outgoing invoice. The offer from the settlement modalities is copied with all positions into an outgoing invoice.
- Generate, post and download invoice(s)
With this function, invoices are made available to the user as a collected ZIP file. Unlike the function "Create invoice", several invoices can be created at once.
After the recurring invoice has been created:
The dialogue "Runs carried out" gives a detailed overview in the tab "Result" of who has carried out a run and what the result of this run was. The information on the number of serial invoices created, number of PDF documents created, and other information is listed here.
However, this dialogue also shows whether a run for the creation of serial invoices is currently active, which was started by another user!
Such a current run can now be ended prematurely so that a new run can be started immediately.
In the additional tab "Included invoices" all details of the invoices that were part of a serial invoice run can be viewed. Double-clicking on an invoice leads directly to the invoice in the project context.
Additional information on rounding situations in the series calculation:
If you have set monthly (1/12), quarterly (1/4) or half-yearly (1/2) as the cycle, the amounts are calculated proportionately. Otherwise, the amounts are included in full in the outgoing invoice.
The invoice is created, posted and saved. Afterwards, a corresponding document is created and opened using the stored document template. If necessary, you can still make changes to the document and print it out.
When creating the outgoing invoice, rounding errors may occur due to the system. These rounding errors are not corrected.
Example:
Total amount to be billed = 199.50 euros. If you bill this amount (as shown in the screenshots) 12 times at 16.63 euros each, the sum of these partial amounts is 199.56 euros.
In the evaluation within the project, the serial invoice is displayed in the report Single items > Revenues.
In the evaluation within the project, the serial invoice is displayed in the target / actual comparison report.