A Guide to Invoice Consolidation

In this guide, we'll cover everything you need to know about invoice consolidation in Upmind, from enabling the feature to managing payment methods.

Enabling Invoice Consolidation

You can effectively enable invoice consolidation in Upmind and manage client permissions to control billing processes within your brand. Here’s how you do it:

1. Go to setting
2. Click Order Options
3. Scroll down to find the "Consolidation" section
4. Check the box to enable invoice consolidation

If you want to limit client access and only allow staff members to handle consolidation, check the box of “Allow only staff using that feature”. This prevents clients from directly using the feature.

Consolidation Timing Options

Invoice consolidation helps in grouping multiple invoices into one, based on specific rules. The key point to understand is that we consolidate invoices based on their next_invoice_date, not their due date. Below are the rules and options for how consolidation works:

1. Consolidation Rule: This feature allows you to define specific rules in how invoices are consolidated based on logical criteria you set. The options are:

   
   1. Consolidate the invoices on a selected date of each month:
      Choose a date, like the 15th, and the system will consolidate invoices from that date up to the day before the same date next month.
   2. Consolidate the invoice on the first day of the month:
      Every 1st day of the month, the system consolidates invoices for the entire month ahead.
   3. Consolidate the invoices on the last day of the month:
      On the last day of each month, the system consolidates all invoices with next_invoice_dates for the upcoming month, excluding the last day of that month
   4. Collect the invoices on a selected day of the week (collect all the invoices for the current week):
      On a specified day (e.g., Monday), the system consolidates invoices for the entire week, from that day through to the end of the current week
   5. Consolidate invoices which will be issued on the same day:
      On any given day, the system consolidates all invoices scheduled to be issued on that day

2. Consolidation Rule - Date of Month: This option specifies on which date of the month the system should consolidate invoices. For example, you might choose to consolidate invoices on the 1st, 15th, or last day of each month based on your business needs and billing cycles.

   

3. Consolidation Rule - Day of Week: Similar to the date of month option, this specifies on which day of the week (Monday, Tuesday, etc.) the invoices should be consolidated.

   

4. Due Date Interval for Consolidation Invoices (in days): If you set the interval to 7 days, the due date of the consolidated invoice will be set 7 days before the next_invoice_date of the earliest product or service date among the invoices being consolidated.

   

Client Overrides and Exclusions

If you do not check the option "Allow only staff using that feature," clients can manage invoice consolidation rules from their client area.

In certain situations, your client may wish to exclude certain products from consolidation. In the client area, they can follow these steps:

1. Navigate to Products and Services.
2. Select the product they wish to exclude.
3. Go to the Billing tab.
4. Find Invoice Consolidation and change it to Exclude invoice when consolidating.
5. Click Save.

While if you decide that only admins can manage consolidation, you can handle individual requests from your clients on a case-by-case basis.

1. If a client requests to exclude specific products from consolidation, you can exclude the product by navigating to: Products & Services in Client Profile > select the Product > Click Setting > Choose "Exclude invoices when consolidating."

   

2. If a client requests not to consolidate any invoices, you can exclude the client entirely by going to: Go to Settings in Client Profile > Click Billing > Then, click "Do not consolidate invoices."

   

3. If you want to exclude a specific product from consolidation invoices, navigate to: Go to Product & Services > Click Product Automation > Click "Exclude from invoice consolidation.

   

When Things are Consolidated Automatically

We consolidated the invoice based on:

• Client
• Client Address or Company details
• Currency

Here's an example of a case:

• Same Client with Different Currencies:
  • If a client has one service billed in USD and another in EUR, they will receive two separate invoices, one for each currency
• Same Client with Different Addresses:
  • If a client has services with different addresses (e.g., a UK address billed in GBP, another UK address billed in EUR, and a DE address billed in EUR), they will receive separate invoices based on the combination of address and currency:
    • One invoice in GBP for the UK address.
    • Two separate invoices in EUR, one for each address (UK and DE)

Payment Methods On Consolidation

When a client has already entered their payment method in their client area, Upmind will use the default payment method. It ignores any specific payment methods set for individual services during consolidation.