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Send an invoice to a customer

by Intuit•9• Updated about 3 hours ago

Learn how QuickBooks Online sends invoices to customers.

Once you’ve created an invoice, you can inform the customer by sending it attached to an email, share a link in a text message or an email, or share it with WhatsApp.

Let’s go over how to create an invoice. We’ll show you how to add customers, products and services to an invoice. And then how to save and send them. Let’s start by looking at the Customers List. Select Sales and select Customers. The Customers list keeps track of who you sell things to and provide services for. It also gives you the current balance for each of your customers. Use it to see what customers owe you, or sometimes, what you owe them. Let's create an invoice for an existing customer. Go to the Create icon and select Invoice. The first thing is to record the customer’s name. Notice that QuickBooks populates both the billing address and the email address for this customer. That’s because this info was already in the customers list. However, if you need to add a new customer you can do by selecting Add new. If you want to send to invoice to more than one address, use a comma between each one. You can CC or BCC an address too. QuickBooks also lets you add a Pay Now button to the invoice. That way customers can pay with a credit or debit card or a bank transfer. The Date should be the day you send the invoice. Or, if this transaction happened in the past, the date you issued the invoice. Terms sets the number of days a customer has to pay the invoice. You can add other things too. Go to the Gear icon to add things like Shipping and custom fields. In the Products and Services area, enter what you're charging the customer for. If you don’t find a product or service that looks right, select Add New to create a new one. If you set up the product or service ahead of time, you'll see the Sales Description and Price you entered earlier. You can also enter or change these while you create the invoice. Add as many products and services as you want. There are more options further down the form. You can enter a message to include on the invoice. You can also add a statement memo. A statement memo shows up as a note on your customer’s statement if you send them. You have several options for saving invoices. You can save the invoice and keep on working It. You can Save and Close, which saves the invoice and brings you back to whatever you were doing before. You can Save and Share a Link. This option saves the invoice and simply emails a link to the customer. When they select the link they’ll see the invoice. Save and send lets you write an email to your customer and will attach the invoice to the email. And you can use Save and New if you want to save the invoice and create another one. Let's select Save and Send. On the left you can see and change the subject and body of the email you’re sending. And on the right you see a preview of what your customer will receive. Select Send and Close to send the invoice. QuickBooks confirms that the email was sent to your customer. And you can see the customer’s balance has increased by the amount of the invoice. Now you’re ready to create your own invoices.

Prerequisites

Before proceeding, create at least one invoice.

Send an invoice to your customer

Send an invoice by email from either your QuickBooks Online account email, or from a specified Gmail address. The invoice is attached as a PDF.

Follow this link to complete the steps in product Open this link in a new window

  1. Find the invoice you want to send.
  2. If you want to review or edit the invoice first,
    1. Select View/Edit.
    2. Make any changes, if needed.
    3. Make sure to enter the Customer email.
      Note: If your customer has a listed email, it’s completed automatically.
    4. Once you’re done, select Save and send.
    5. Optional: To change the email address you’re sending the invoice from:
      • Select the From ▼ dropdown, then select an email address.
      • To connect a Gmail address, select + Add Gmail address and follow the steps shown. You can only connect one Gmail address to your account.
        Note: To ensure QuickBooks can successfully send your emails, select the Send email on your behalf option, then select Allow. If you experience email delivery issues:
        • Follow the steps on the last bullet to remove the Gmail address.
        • Re-add your Gmail.
        • Select the Send email on your behalf option again and select Allow.
      • To remove a Gmail address, select Image Alt Text Remove Gmail address.
    6. Update the email content if needed, then select Send and close.
  3. Or, if you want to directly send the invoice,
    1. Select Send from the dropdown ▼ under the Action column.
    2. In To, enter the email addresses you want to send the invoice‌ to.
      Note: If your customer has a listed email, it’s completed automatically.
    3. Optional: To change the email address you’re sending the invoice from:
      • Select the From ▼ dropdown, then select an email address.
      • To connect a Gmail address, select + Add Gmail address and follow the steps shown. You can only connect one Gmail address to your account.
        Note: To ensure QuickBooks can successfully send your emails, select the Send email on your behalf option, then select Allow. If you experience email delivery issues:
        • Follow the steps on the last bullet to remove the Gmail address.
        • Re-add your Gmail.
        • Select the Send email on your behalf option again and select Allow.
      • To remove a Gmail address, select Delete icon. Remove Gmail address, then select Yes, remove it! to confirm.
    4. Update the email content if needed, then select Send.

Notes:

  • QuickBooks Online can’t access your emails, but anyone with permission to send an invoice on your account, can send it from a connected email address. 
  • Once you send an invoice, the status will display as Sent on the Invoices page. 
  • If there’s a problem sending to a CC or BCC email address from a Gmail address, you’ll get a notification email from Gmail.

Share an invoice link

To share an invoice link:

Follow this link to complete the steps in product Open this link in a new window

  1. Find the invoice you want to share.
  2. Select Share invoice link from the dropdown ▼ under the Action column.
  3. Select Copy link, then select Done.
  4. Paste this link and share it with your customer in a text message or an email.

Share an invoice with WhatsApp

Follow this link to complete the steps in product Open this link in a new window

  1. Find the invoice you want to share.
  2. Select View/Edit and make any changes, if needed.
  3. Once you’re done, select Save & Share (WhatsApp).
  4. Update the message if needed, then select Share and Close.
  5. Follow the steps to share the invoice with WhatsApp.

Next steps

With PayPal, customers can pay their invoices directly with credit cards.

When your customer pays an invoice, record the payment manually in QuickBooks Online.

Related links

QuickBooks Online EssentialsQuickBooks Online PlusQuickBooks Online Simple Start