How to add a different discount to each line in an invoice

Hello, 

Offering discounts to your customers is a great business idea, and it can really help you generate excitement about your services! QuickBooks Online lets you add discounts to your overall invoice, as you've learned from the article you've sent, but there's a workaround you can use to add a discount to your line items individually. I'll explain how to do that.

If you give set discounts for set amounts, create a new product item that you can add to invoices or sales receipts.

Step 1: Create a discount item

1. Select Settings ⚙ and then Products and Services.
2. Select New to create a new item.
3. Select Non-inventory or Service for the type.
4. Name the item Discount. If you want to create multiple discount items, give them unique names so they're easy to tell apart.
5. In the Sales price/rate field, enter the discount as a negative amount. Keep in mind, this is a dollar amount and not a percentage.
6. From the Income account drop-down menu, select the Discount given account. QuickBooks creates this account for you when you turn on the discount feature.
7. From the Sales tax category drop-down menu, select Nontaxable.
8. When you’re done, select Save and close.

Step 2: Add the discount to an invoice or sales receipt

1. Select the + New button.
2. Select Invoice or Sales receipt.
3. Add products and services. Then fill out the rest of the form.
4. Add the Discount item you just created. You can adjust the discount if you need to, just make sure it's a negative amount.
5. When you’re ready, select Save and send or Save and new.

That's all there is to it. So simple! 

I hope this helps get you back on track. 

Have a great day.

Thank you AddieB,

So, if I get it right the easiest thing to do would be to add one of those "discount product" with a value of -1$ and then on an invoice add a line item selling X number of those minus one dollar items until the amount matches the actual discount.  Yes, that is doable and a useful hack. I will probably end up using your trick. I still think is cumbersome. For instance, I am selling services and I can see an hour of labour that I call DESIGN_HOUR with a discount of 10% but another one call DEPLOYMENT_HOUR at 5% discount. An it changes very time. So, it becomes really cumbersome.

Anyway, thanks for the reply and the trick.

Best,

Wilmar

Wilmar, 

I see what you're saying. Actually, it's even more simple than that! While you can create your discount item with a value of -1$, you can adjust the discount if you need to on the invoice, just make sure it's a negative amount. You'll have to do the manual calculation for how many dollars is equal to your 5% and 10% amounts.

Let me know if I can clarify further for you. 

Cheers!

This proposed work around is not convenient or conducive to how most of us need to provide proposals. We need the ability to quote individual line items that show List Price, Discount %, and Net Price as many products have different discount percentages. Is this functionality on the horizon in QBO? 

Hi there. Thanks for joining the thread. I know how handy it would be to have a feature dedicated to discounting each line item individually. While I can't guarantee that this will be implemented in the near future, it's always a good idea to make your suggestions by clicking the Gear icon > Feedback. Our engineering team read these messages daily, and are always looking for ways to improve the product. 

I think this feature would be particularly helpful, so I'm going to pass on your feedback as well on my end. If anything changes, I'd be happy to update you here. 

It would be incredibly handy to have this feature. We offer sibling discounts in our line of work and it takes so much time to have to work out the percentage for one child as we don't want to discount the whole invoice.

It would be great to have access to this setting: https://quickbooks.intuit.com/learn-support/en-in/manage-customers-and-income/discount-by-line-item-...

Ditto I can't believe that in the desktop version I can't add a line item discount as the previous threads mention... Retail price (PER unit) | Discount (by percentage OR dollar PER unit) | Net Price. Also it shouldn't be assigned to an account or tax item as this represents a "courtesy/discretionary" discount that does not need to be tracked for any tax accounting purposes, though it might useful to be able to be able to do reports on discounts provided. 

Hi all,

I am actually looking for something a bit different. Typically in my industry, we give out two lines of discounts on the overall invoice and not on the line items. I have been able to add one line but I can't seem to add a second layer of discount on the entire invoice. Can anyone assist if this actually exists?

Thanks

Thanks for joining us here Melange,

I understand how important it is for your QuickBooks program to accurately create your invoices. I'll be happy to share the steps you can take to apply two layers of discounts on your overall invoice.

In addition to the steps to manually create a discount item given in the original response on this thread, there's another way to apply discounts to sales forms in QuickBooks Online. The other way is to turn on the discount feature in your settings and then apply a discount percentage or discount value on your overall invoice. These steps are outline below.

Step 1: Turn on the discount feature

1. Select Settings ⚙ and then Account and Settings.
2. Select the Sales tab on the menu.
3. In the Sales form content section, select the pencil ✏ icon to edit it.
4. Select the Discount checkbox to turn it on.
5. Then select Save and then Done.

This adds the discount field to your invoices and sales receipts. QuickBooks also creates a Discount given account to track everything on your chart of accounts.

Step 2: Apply a discount as a percentage or a specific amount

Use the discount field on an invoice or sales receipt.

1. Select the + New button.
2. Select Invoice or Sales receipt.
3. Add products and services. Then fill out the rest of the form.
4. Select Discount percentage or Discount value to enter the discount as a percentage or a specific amount.
5. Enter the amount you want to discount in the discount field.
6. When you're finished, select Save and send or Save and close.

To apply two layers of discounts, you can either create and apply two discount items on your overall invoice, or you can use the discount feature for one layer and a created discount item for the second layer of the discount.

 I hope this helps! Let me know if you need any clarification. :)