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SSBookeeping
June 16, 2020
Question

combine Progress invoicing and Invoice for Time and Expenses when billing client

  • June 16, 2020
  • 1 reply
  • 0 views

Hello, 

 

Is there any way to combine the processes of "Progress Invoicing" and "Invoicing for Time and Expenses".  Each method works great on its own, but to be able to combine the methods when you are invoicing values instead of percentages would be wonderful.   

 

I prefer the format of the progress billing because a client can see what they have paid to date against their estimate using actual values in the Progress invoice function.  I have to use the "Invoicing for Time and Expenses" because my time is precious and don't want to go back and uncheck all the unbilled expenses after I billed them through progress invoicing.  It is manual function dependent on the user that opens up the possibility of errors if you forget to uncheck an expense.  

 

What would be great and more efficient is that when a user go to enter a value in progress invoicing, that the "Choose billable time and costs" pop up window would appear and the user is able to choose the appropriate labour and expenses incurred up to that point for that particular value.  Then the labour and expenses would automatically clear off the "Unbilled Items" report automatically and we would not have to do this manually.

 

On the flip side, is there a way to enter the estimate values as a column on the invoice when using "Invoicing for Time and Expenses"?  Please let me know if this is possible in 2020 Premier edition or is a update to quickbooks that is in the works.

 

Thank you very much for your assistance!

1 reply

L
LauraAB
June 16, 2020

Hello SSBookeeping,

 

I appreciate the detailed explanation of what you're looking to do in QuickBooks Desktop with combining the progress invoicing and billable time/expenses feature. Being able to complete your bookkeeping tasks in as few steps as possible is a great way to save time and minimize errors, as you've mentioned. I'm happy to go over the options in QuickBooks Desktop for you.

 

When you create an invoice from an estimate in QuickBooks Desktop, you'll still see the option Add Time/Costs available in the main tool panel on the transaction. That window won't automatically pop up like you might be used to with other invoice transactions, and that's simply because it's being created from the estimate to start.

 

If you're simply hoping to add the billable time and costs to the invoice to include it along with what's already entered in from the estimate, then it's as simple as that. From what you're describing, however, it may be a bit more complicated than that. It sounds instead like you're giving your customer an estimate for expenses that you'll be entering in as billable items later, then once you create the invoice, you want to link those items. If that's the case, that's not something that's within the program's capabilities at this time.

 

I encourage you to submit feedback about this using the following steps: select Help from the top menu bar in QuickBooks Desktop, then choose Send Feedback Online. The Product Suggestion option would be great for this situation. This lets our product developers know the features users like you are looking for to help manage your books.

 

Enjoy the rest of your day. :)

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