Product
Mail Books Ecommerce Assistant
Pricing Partners Demo Security Q&A Log in Request access

Help › Invoicing

Bill a quote in stages

Open this in Talisk HQ

A big job is rarely one invoice. You quote $20,000 for a bathroom, take 30% when the customer signs so you can order the fixtures, bill 40% at rough-in, and bill the rest when you finish. Progress billing raises each of those as its own invoice against the same quote, and keeps count of what is left.

  1. Go to Invoicing, then Quotes, and open the quote.
  2. Choose Bill a stage.
  3. Say how much this stage is for, in one of four ways:
    • Percentage of the quote, which is the usual way to bill a stage
    • Amount, when the stage is a fixed figure such as the cost of the materials
    • The rest, which bills everything still outstanding
    • Per line, which bills a share of each item on the quote
  4. TALISK_HQ raises the stage as a draft invoice and opens it. Send it as you would any other.

The quote stays open and shows what has been billed and what is left, so you can come back to it at each stage. Those figures are before tax, because each stage carries its own. Once you have billed all of it the quote closes on its own.

Use "the rest" for the last stage

If you bill three stages of 33.33% on a $1,000 quote you have billed $999.99, and one cent sits on the quote forever. Choosing The rest works out the remaining balance by subtraction instead, so the last stage always lands exactly and the quote closes properly.

Billing a share of each item instead

The first three ways treat a stage as a milestone against the whole job, and the invoice carries one line saying so. Per line is the other way: you say how much of each item on the quote this stage bills, and the invoice carries a row for each of them, worded the way the customer read it on the quote.

Choose Per line, then pick how the shares are sized: a percentage of each line, an amount for each line, or the rest of each. Leave a line blank and it is simply not on this invoice. Each line shows what it was quoted at and what is still left on it, so you can see at a glance what has already gone out.

Use it when the customer is paying for the work in the pieces they can see, such as the materials now and the labour on completion. Use a percentage of the whole quote when the stage is a milestone rather than a delivery, which is the more common way a trade bills a job.

Two things to know. TALISK_HQ refuses a share that is more than a line has left, the same way it refuses a stage that is more than the quote has left, and you can confirm past it if the work genuinely grew. And a quote carrying a discount cannot be billed this way, because its lines no longer add up to its total; bill it as a percentage or an amount instead.

Use "the rest of each" only if every stage was billed per line

If you billed an earlier stage as a percentage of the whole quote, that money came off the job rather than off any one item, so the items still show their full amounts. Billing the rest of every line then adds up to more than the quote has left, and TALISK_HQ refuses it. The screen says so before you get there, and the answer is the plain The rest, which always closes the quote exactly whatever came before it.

Tax is worked out at the date of each stage

A stage billed in June and a stage billed in October are two separate supplies. Each invoice carries the sales tax rate in force on its own date, which is the same rule TALISK_HQ follows when you convert a whole quote. The price your customer agreed to does not change; only the tax on top of it can.

If you go over the quoted amount

TALISK_HQ refuses a stage that would take the total past what you quoted, and tells you how much is left. That is almost always a percentage entered twice or a final invoice raised for the whole job after you had already billed some of it. If the work genuinely grew, the honest answer is a new quote for the extra, so your customer sees the change. If you do want to bill over the quoted amount, confirm and TALISK_HQ will raise it.

Deposits and stages work together

If the customer paid a deposit up front, apply it to whichever stage invoice you like. The deposit reduces what that invoice is asking for, exactly as it would on any other invoice.

A declined or cancelled quote cannot be billed

If your customer said no, or you withdrew the quote, Bill a stage is not offered and TALISK_HQ refuses the request. Billing against it would be invoicing work nobody agreed to. If the job went ahead after all, raise a new quote for what was actually agreed.

Good to know: Each stage is a real invoice: it posts to your books, it ages, and it carries the sales tax in force on the day you raise it, not the day you wrote the quote. The quote stays open, and shows what is left, until you have billed all of it. You can bill a stage as a milestone against the whole job, which puts one line on the invoice naming the quote and the percentage, or line by line, which puts one row on the invoice for each item you billed part of. Talisk does not hold back a retainage percentage for you. A quote that carries a discount cannot be billed line by line, because its lines no longer add up to its total; bill it as a percentage or an amount instead. A quote your customer declined, or one you cancelled, cannot be billed in stages at all. It refuses a stage that would take you past the quoted total, or past what is left on any one line, unless you confirm, because that is normally a change order rather than a stage.

Related