Enter Bills

Enter Bills records a bill a vendor has sent you: goods they delivered, a service they did, rent, a phone bill, freight billed on its own. You enter the bill when it arrives, and SeroBooks adds what you owe to the vendor's account (Accounts Payable), puts the goods into stock at the cost on the bill, charges anything that is not stock to its expense account, and records the tax you can claim back. Later you pay the bill with Pay Bills, or from the bill itself.

Use a different form when:

• You are paying on the spot by cheque and there is no bill to keep track of: Write Cheques.
• You paid with a credit card: Enter Credit Card Charges.
• It is a running cost such as rent or hydro and you prefer the simpler expense form with a category: Enter Expenses.
• The goods came in against a purchase order: Receive Items records the goods and the bill together.
• The vendor gave you a credit or you are sending goods back: Enter Vendor Credits.

Opening Enter Bills

• Vendors ▸ Enter Bills.
• On the Home Page, Enter Bills in the Vendors panel.
• From the Bills list, New Purchase.

The window is titled Enter Bills. In View ▸ Multiple Windows each bill you open from a list gets its own window, so you can have a new bill and several saved ones open side by side.

Enter a bill, step by step

1. Check that Bill is selected at the top (not Credit).
2. In VENDOR, start typing the vendor's name and pick them from the list that drops under the box. Their balance is shown in the list. The vendor's company, phone, email and address fill in, and the bill picks up the vendor's payment terms and currency.
3. Set the BILL DATE to the date printed on the vendor's bill. This decides the period the purchase and its tax fall in.
4. Type the vendor's invoice number in VENDOR'S INVOICE #.
5. Add the lines:
   • For goods and services on your Item List, stay on the Items tab and scan or type in Scan or type to add items (name / code)…. Then correct each line's QTY and COST.
   • For anything that is not an item — rent, a phone bill, a repair — switch to the Expenses tab and enter one line per account.
   • See Bill lines for every column, the tax on each line and the other ways to add lines.
6. Check the tax. Each line carries its own rate; Set tax for all lines sets one rate on every item line.
7. In the panel on the right, set anything else the bill says: a DISCOUNT, SHIPPING, the TERMS, a NOTE, a CURRENCY other than your own, the job or class.
8. Under Payment, leave On Account to pay later. If you paid the bill already, choose how (for example Cheque) and type the reference.
9. Tick anything under When this is saved: Print, Save PDF, Email or WhatsApp.
10. Choose Save Bill — $… due (or Save Bill — $… paid), or Save & New to save and start another bill straight away.

After saving, a message confirms the bill (Purchase … recorded — stock is in, on credit.) with a Print / email… button, and the Bills list opens. Save & New leaves you on a blank bill.

The top of the bill

The panel on the right

Totals

The top card adds the bill up:

Below the tax: Each line carries its own rate. (or No tax on these lines.) and Set tax for all lines. When the bill has both a discount and tax, a note reminds you that the tax is charged on the full line values and the discount comes off after it; if your vendor discounted before tax, enter the reduced unit costs instead.

If a line names a tax rate this computer has not received yet, a TAX RATES ARE BEHIND card appears above the totals. The tax is kept exactly as recorded; choose Fetch tax rates to name the rate.

Document

Each tile opens a small dialog. Choose Apply to keep what you typed, or Remove to clear the tile.

Stock

A bill is a bill, as in QuickBooks: saving puts its item quantities into stock at the location on each line and the bill into your books and Pay Bills. The line under the save button says so: Saving puts these quantities INTO stock at this location. There is no deliver-by date on a bill; that belongs on a purchase order.

A bill saved as Pending by an earlier version of SeroBooks shows a Stock choice when you open it: Received — stock in now or Pending. A Pending bill moved no stock and posted nothing, so it is not in Accounts Payable, Pay Bills or Vendor Balances (the line under the save button says A Pending bill moves NO stock and posts nothing — it is not owed in Payables — until it is marked Received.). Choose Received — stock in now and save once the goods are in.

Payment

Long-press a payment button to make it the one every new bill starts on, on this computer. SeroBooks asks Start every bill on …?; choose Make default. The default button is marked.

When this is saved

Tick Print, Save PDF, Email or WhatsApp before saving, and each happens once the bill exists. Email asks for the address (the vendor's email is filled in) and WhatsApp for the number. On a saved bill these become buttons under Send this document.

The save buttons

Both need a vendor and at least one line, on the Items tab or the Expenses tab: a bill can be all expenses (rent, the phone bill), as in QuickBooks.

A bill in another currency

A vendor whose record is in another currency brings it to the bill: the CURRENCY tile shows, for example, USD @ 1.3650, at the rate for the bill's date from your Currency List. For a vendor in your home currency, choose CURRENCY (or Invoiced in another currency) and type the Currency code and Rate (home currency per 1 unit).

Every amount on the bill stays in your home currency: it is what the goods cost you, and it is what your books hold. The currency and rate record what the vendor's own invoice said — the panel shows Vendor invoiced … USD. When you pay the bill later at a different rate, the difference is booked as an exchange gain or loss rather than left on the vendor's account. The cross (Not a foreign bill) takes the currency off.

Read the vendor's invoice instead of typing it

Read the vendor's invoice (under the item search) takes the vendor's bill as a PDF or a photo (JPG, PNG, WebP or HEIC) and fills in the bill for you:

• the VENDOR'S INVOICE #, if you have not typed one;
• the vendor, but only when the name on the document matches exactly one of your vendors;
• every line it can match to an item on your Item List, with its quantity and unit cost.

It never creates items. Lines it cannot match are listed in an amber note by the vendor's own wording (… NOT added), so you can search for them or add the items first. A document with no itemised lines is refused with a note to use Enter Expenses instead. Read from file name under the search shows which file the lines came from. Check every line before saving.

What happens in the books

When a bill is saved:

A bill paid at entry also records the payment: Accounts Payable is debited and the bank, cash or card account is credited. See How each transaction posts to the books and Tax on invoices, bills and expenses.

Working with a saved bill

Opening a bill from the Bills list, a vendor's ledger or a report opens it in this same form, with a blue EDITING band across the top showing the bill's number and what editing will do:

• Unpaid — edit freely. Stock and what you owe follow what you save.
• Paid $… of $… — edits adjust the balance owed.
• Paid in full — a change here reopens the balance on this vendor account.

On the right, below the totals, a saved bill has:

• BILL BALANCE: what is still owed, and how much has been paid.
• Pay $…: pays this bill now. See Pay one bill from the bill.
• Freight & duty: spreads freight, duty and brokerage over the lines as landed cost. See Bill lines.
• Print labels: barcode labels for the items at the quantities on the bill.
• Void bill...: QuickBooks' Edit ▸ Void Bill. SeroBooks asks Are you sure you want to void this bill?; choose Void. The bill stays in the books with its number, at zero, marked VOID.
• Delete bill...: see The Bills list.
• VENDOR'S INVOICE: attach the vendor's own PDF or a photo of it (Attach a PDF or image, Photograph a receipt). Keep the source document with every bill.
• A stamp showing who created and last changed the bill, and whether it has been audited. An accountant can choose Mark audited.

Saving an edited bill sends the whole bill again: stock and the vendor's balance are adjusted to match. If the bill had already been paid and now totals less, SeroBooks tells you the difference is now a credit with the vendor: it is offered in Pay Bills against their next bill, or you can record their refund. If goods are going back, use a return instead of deleting the line; see Enter Vendor Credits.

A bill that came from receiving a purchase order opens read-only: its quantities belong to the receipt. Correct it with a return. A person whose role may not edit bills also sees the bill read-only.

Permissions

See Roles and permissions explained.

Messages you may see

Tips

• Enter bills on the date printed on them, not the day you type them, so they land in the right GST period.
• Type the vendor's invoice number every time. It is how SeroBooks catches a bill entered twice, and how you find a bill when the vendor calls.
• When you type an item, the line shows last paid $… — tap to use (or catalogue cost … — tap to use for an item never bought before). The cost box starts at that figure; click the hint to put it back.
• Attach the vendor's PDF to the bill. It is what an accountant or an auditor asks for.

Common problems

Save Bill is greyed out. Choose the vendor, and add at least one line on the Items tab or the Expenses tab (an Expenses line counts once it has an account or an amount).

The bill is not in Pay Bills. It was saved as Pending by an earlier version. Open it, choose Received — stock in now, and save. The Bill Tracker lists such bills with the status Pending.

The tax on the bill does not match the vendor's. Each item line starts with the item's own tax rate, and each Expenses line with the account's usual rate. Change the rate on the line, or use Set tax for all lines. See Bill lines.

I cannot change the date. Your role does not have Change the Bill Date. Ask an administrator.

Related articles

• Bill lines: items, expenses, tax and landed costs
• The Bills list
• Pay Bills
• Enter Vendor Credits
• Receive Items
• Tax on invoices, bills and expenses