Sending Invoices
The process for collecting payments from clients is as follows:
- The project lead enters the billing information for the relevant time period in the
Financial Planning
spreadsheet. - A member of the Finance Working Group (WG) creates an invoice and sends it to the client using QuickBooks Online using the information from the spreadsheet.
- The Operations Coordinator settles the invoice payment after it is received.
- Monthly bookkeeping and reconciliation of books.
1. Populate Financial Planning Spreadsheet (Project Lead)
If this is the first time the client is being invoiced:
- Confirm with the client which currency they will be invoiced in, and in what country their financial institution is based.
- Work with the Finance WG to set up the right invoice template and cost centres.
Go to the Customer Invoices
sheet of the Financial Planning
spreadsheet and fill in the details for the invoice:
Period
: It should match the upcoming Service Period at the top of the sheet.Service Date
: The end date of the provided service. If a client is billed monthly, this would list the last day of the billed month.Description
Qty
Rate (<currency>)
Sales Tax
- Notify the Finance WG that the invoice data is ready.
Access to the
Financial Planning
spreadsheet is controlled by the Finance WG.
2. Send Invoice in QuickBooks Online (Finance WG)
Go to Quickbooks Online.
If the client has not been set up:
- Open the
Customers & leads
menu and selectCustomers
. - Click
New customer
. - Enter the client details and click
Save
.
If the project has not been set up:
- Open the
Projects
menu. - Click
New project
. - Enter the project details, including the correct client, and click
Save
.
To create an invoice:
- Open the
Invoicing
menu and selectInvoices
. - Click
Create invoice
- Select the Project from the dropdown menu. QuickBooks will autofill all the client information.
- Copy and paste all the line items from the
Financial Planning
spreadsheet:- Service Date
- Description
- Qty
- Rate
- Sales Tax
- Leave the
Class
column blank
- At the bottom of the page, click
Customize
to select the invoice template listed in theFinancial Planning
spreadsheet.- If a new template is required or the payment information needs to be changed:
- Select the
Content
tab, click on the bottom section of the template preview to reveal theAdd payment details and footer
section. - Enter the applicable payment information, you can look at a previous invoices for examples.
- Review the invoice preview, then click
Done
.
- Select the
- If a new template is required or the payment information needs to be changed:
- Click
Preview
and review the information. The calculated total must match the one from theFinancial Planning
spreadsheet.- If this is the first time the client is being invoiced, the invoice must be reviewed by the project lead before it is sent out.
- Click
Save and Send
to send the invoice to the client.
3. Accounts Receivable on client invoices (Operations Coordinator)
Before sending new ones, review invoices from the previous month(s) in Quickbooks, and send reminders on any items that are overdue.
Ensure each client has paid their invoices each month, and these payments have been matched and applied to invoices in Quickbooks (QB). Most of these come through Wise, or by cheque and direct deposit to our Desjardins account. Refresh feeds in QB to ensure the most up-to-date transactions are available. Invoices are Net 15, and are due roughly mid-month depending on when they were sent out
4 Monthly bookkeeping hand-off
Monthly checklist for hand-off to bookkeeper
- Accounts Receivable - Match previous month's payments to the client invoices in QB, and send out reminders on any overdue invoices.
- Make sure all of the receipts have been forwarded to QuickBooks, including contractor invoices
- Login and download invoice from the Amanah account
- Desjardins: Login to the account and download the bank statement and Visa statement. Add to the Desjardins folders in Drive.
- Wagepoint: Login into the account and download Payroll Register and Posting Journal documents. Add to the Payroll Information folder in Drive. There is usually an email notification from Wagepoint when these documents are available by the 9th or 10th of the month.
- Ensure that all of the bank feeds in QB have been refreshed and are up to date.
- Notify the bookkeeper when everything is ready for them to do the monthly bookkeeping
- The bookkeeper sends a follow up email with their reports when they have completed the bookkeeping for the month.