How invoices work

An invoice is the bill you send a client: what they owe, for what, and by when. In EyeOnTask it is also where the money is tracked — every payment recorded against it moves the paid and remaining figures, so an invoice tells you not just what was charged but what is still outstanding.

What an invoice can be attached to

What an invoice is attached to decides where it shows up and how much of it fills itself in. An invoice can stand alone, or it can be attached to one job, to several jobs, or to a contract.

No job — a standalone invoice

Any client can be invoiced without any job behind it. You raise it from Invoices → Add Invoice and type or fetch the lines yourself. This is the bill for goods sold, a call-out charge, a deposit — anything where no scheduled work is involved. See creating an invoice.

One job

Bill a single job and the invoice belongs to it. You can see that invoice from inside the job, on its Item / Invoice → Invoice tab, which is also where it is most easily raised. See invoicing from a job.

Several jobs on one invoice

One invoice can cover many jobs — the month’s work for a client billed together, rather than a bill per visit.

A multi-job invoice does not display inside the job the way a single-job one does. The job instead points out to the invoice that covers it. So if you are on a job and expecting to find its bill sitting there, and it isn’t, the work has almost certainly been swept onto a combined invoice — follow the link through rather than raising a second one.

Jobs are gathered onto an invoice with Fetch & Link. Once they are on, the invoice shows the linked job codes as chips and colour-codes each job’s line items, so you can see which visit produced which charge — see reading an invoice that has jobs on it.

A contract

A contract can be invoiced with or without jobs, and the two behave differently:

• Without jobs — the contract amount arrives as a line item in its own right. That is the recurring fee: what the client owes for the period regardless of what happened during it.
• With jobs — the items used on those jobs come onto the invoice automatically. You are billing the actual work, not a flat figure.

Both can appear on the same invoice: the fee as one line, the period’s job items alongside it. See invoicing a contract.

How an invoice gets raised

Route	Use it when
Invoices → Add Invoice	Billing something with no job behind it — see creating an invoice
From a job	The work is done and you are billing that job — see invoicing from a job
From a contract	The recurring fee, the period’s jobs, or both — see invoicing a contract
From a quote	The client approved the offer and there is nothing to schedule — see converting a quote

Some invoices are not raised by a person at all. A contract with a recurring pattern generates its own, and those show Created By: System.

Finding your invoices

Invoices on the main menu opens the list.

Main menu

Simple View puts the list down the left and the selected invoice alongside it. The search icon narrows it.

Invoices → Simple View

Invoices → list tabs

Each entry in the list shows its code, client, amount and a Paid or Unpaid badge, grouped under the invoice date. Three tabs sit above the list:

• All — everything.
• Invoice — real invoices only.
• Proforma Invoice — proformas only. See proforma invoices below.

Proforma invoices

A proforma invoice is the same document as an invoice in every visible way — same form, same fields, same line items, same totals. One thing separates them: a proforma is not included in your calculations.

That is the whole point. A proforma says this is what it will cost. It is not a bill, so it should not appear in what you are owed, and it does not. Send one where the client needs the figures on paper before there is anything to bill — to raise a purchase order, to pay in advance, to declare a value.

Creating one works exactly like creating an invoice. When it becomes real, convert it into an invoice: it starts counting, it can be paid against, and it behaves like any other invoice from then on.

Note

A proforma the client has already paid against is still a proforma. Until you convert it, your books do not know about the money — and only real invoices sync to your accounts package.

Table View

Table View drops the panel and gives you every invoice on one row.

Invoices → Table View

Four totals sit above the table, covering everything the current filter has matched:

Invoices → Table View, totals

• Invoice Total — what has been billed.
• Paid Amount — what has come in.
• Due Amount — what is still outstanding.
• Advance Amount — money clients hold on account, not yet applied to an invoice. See applying an advance.

The columns carry Invoice Code, Job Code where the invoice bills one, Name, billing address, Invoice Date, Due Date, Total (exc tax), Tax Amount, Total (inc tax) and Paid. The arrows beside a heading sort by it, and an invoice raised from a proforma shows a View Proforma link under its code.

Three columns are about what has happened to the invoice rather than what is on it:

• Pay Now — a link to take payment against that invoice, replaced by a PAID badge once nothing is owed.
• Synced With — whether it has reached your accounts package. See what syncs, and which way.
• Invoice Sent — whether it has gone to the client.

Around the table: Search, a Show All Invoices filter, Show Filtering Options, download and print icons for the list itself, and a column picker for choosing which of the columns are drawn.

Paid, Unpaid and overdue

An invoice is badged Unpaid until it is settled and Paid once nothing remains. Those are the two states the list shows.

Overdue is not a state here. An invoice past its due date still reads Unpaid on this list — overdue is worked out in Reports, from the due date against what is still owed.

Reading an invoice

Invoice page, full view

An invoice opens on three tabs:

• Overview — the bill itself.
• Payment History — what has been received against it. See invoice payments.
• Attachment — files held with the invoice, with the count shown on the tab.

Banners

Notices across the top tell you what this invoice is caught up in — that it is associated with a contract, or that a recurring pattern is adding to it, with a link through to the recurring schedule. If an invoice is behaving in a way you did not expect, read these first.

Invoice page → tabs and banners

An R beside the invoice title means it is a recurring invoice. See how recurring patterns work.

The invoice itself

Invoice page → Overview

• Your company details head the document.
• Invoice Bill To is who is being charged; Ship To is where goods go, which can differ.
• The reference panel carries Invoice Code, Order Reference Number, Invoice Date, Due Date, and — where the invoice belongs to a contract — the Contract Code as a link through to it. Created By and Updated By record who raised it and who last touched it.

Then the line items, with Model No., Qty / Hr, Rate, UOM, Discount (%), Tax (%) and Amount — the amount shown with tax, and the without-tax figure beneath. See invoice line items.

The money

The totals run Sub Total → Additional Discount → Total Amount, and then the two that matter day to day:

• Paid — what has been received.
• Remaining Amount — what is still owed.

Invoice page → totals

A paid invoice cannot be deleted — once money is recorded against it, the invoice is a financial record rather than a draft. See managing invoices.

The action bar

Invoice page → action bar

Alongside Preview & Send Email, Edit Invoice, download and delete, the ≡ menu holds everything else an invoice can do — payments, credit notes, recurring invoices, copying, converting to equipment, marking paid or sent, and syncing to your accounts package. See invoice actions.

Editing, downloading and deleting

Edit Invoice reopens the invoice with everything filled in. Click any field to make it editable — client and address, Project Site, Invoice Code, Invoice Date, Due Date, Order Ref No, Discount on per Item, Currency and Tag(s). The lines are editable in place too, and Amount recalculates as you change quantity, rate, discount or tax. Update saves, confirming with “Invoice updated successfully.”

The Invoice Code is editable here, which matters if your accounts team needs a particular numbering. The Link With row and Fetch & Link also live on this form — see linking jobs to an invoice.

Download gives you the invoice as a PDF — the same document the client receives — either from the action bar or from the Download button inside Preview & Send. Printing is that same PDF; there is no separate print layout.

The search box on the list narrows it by client name or job code, and Table View adds sortable columns and filters for working through a long list.

The delete icon removes the invoice, asking first with Yes, delete it and No, keep it.

Caution

A paid invoice cannot be deleted. Once a payment has been recorded against it, the invoice is a financial record — see invoice payments. If a paid invoice is wrong, correct it by editing it or by issuing a credit note.

If a delete is refused, a recorded payment is almost always the reason.

Where to go next

Page	What it covers
Creating an invoice	The Add Invoice form — bill-to and ship-to, dates, currency, discounts, tags, and unsaved clients
Invoice line items	Items and services, billable lines, free quota, and where labour is added
Invoicing from a job	Generating an invoice from the work, and linking jobs with Fetch & Link
Sending an invoice	Emailing or WhatsApping it, attaching the job card, and collecting a signature
Invoice payments	Recording what comes in, part payments, credit notes and the payment history
Invoice actions	Recurring invoices, copying, converting to equipment, marking paid or sent, and accounts sync
Questions and troubleshooting	Discounts before or after tax, why an invoice won’t delete, and other sticking points

Settings behind this module

• Invoice and accounts settings — Numbering, rounding, discounting method, tax rates and invoice columns