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r-goodrum
Level 2

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

 
Solved
Best answer July 20, 2020

Best Answers
Charies_M
Moderator

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

It's nice to have you here, r-goodrum.

 

You can the Discount Percent or Value feature to apply early payment discounts to your customers. Since discounts are not yet automatically calculated, you'll need to manually apply it on your invoices.

 

Before that, we'll want to turn on the Discount feature from the Account and Settings page. I'll show you how below:

 

  1. Click the Gear icon.
  2. Select Account and Settings.
  3. From the left menu, select Sales.
  4. In the Sales from content section, click the pencil icon to edit.
  5. Put a check mark in the Discount checkbox.
  6. Click Save, then Done.

Once done, you can then apply it on the invoice. When your customer pays early, you can go back to the invoice and apply the discount to zero out the balance.

 

Here's how:

 

  1. Go to the Sales menu, then choose the Invoices tab.
  2. Locate the invoice that was already paid but with a remaining balance.
  3. On the lower right of the invoice, click Discount Percent (value).
  4. Enter the early payment discount amount, then Save and Close.

 

You can also visit this guide about adding discounts to invoices in QuickBooks Online (QBO): Add a discount to an invoice or sales receipt in QuickBooks Online.

 

Feel free to comment below if you have further questions. I would appreciate the opportunity to help you with your concerns.

View solution in original post

14 Comments 14
Charies_M
Moderator

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

It's nice to have you here, r-goodrum.

 

You can the Discount Percent or Value feature to apply early payment discounts to your customers. Since discounts are not yet automatically calculated, you'll need to manually apply it on your invoices.

 

Before that, we'll want to turn on the Discount feature from the Account and Settings page. I'll show you how below:

 

  1. Click the Gear icon.
  2. Select Account and Settings.
  3. From the left menu, select Sales.
  4. In the Sales from content section, click the pencil icon to edit.
  5. Put a check mark in the Discount checkbox.
  6. Click Save, then Done.

Once done, you can then apply it on the invoice. When your customer pays early, you can go back to the invoice and apply the discount to zero out the balance.

 

Here's how:

 

  1. Go to the Sales menu, then choose the Invoices tab.
  2. Locate the invoice that was already paid but with a remaining balance.
  3. On the lower right of the invoice, click Discount Percent (value).
  4. Enter the early payment discount amount, then Save and Close.

 

You can also visit this guide about adding discounts to invoices in QuickBooks Online (QBO): Add a discount to an invoice or sales receipt in QuickBooks Online.

 

Feel free to comment below if you have further questions. I would appreciate the opportunity to help you with your concerns.

r-goodrum
Level 2

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

Exactly what I needed, many thanks.

tfhadmin
Level 1

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

It would help if this article was ACCURATE...it's not!

 

Find the Discount percentage or amount in the lower RIGHT...not LEFT corner of invoice. Please include this info or fix the advice. No one likes wasting time to find the RIGHT answer when WRONG info is presented.

Rasa-LilaM
QuickBooks Team

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

Thanks for joining this thread, tfhadmin


I appreciate following the steps shared by my colleague and letting us know the result. Aside from improving the product’s features, we do the same thing with our line of support and knowledge articles.


Your voice is important because it guides us on what areas we need to improve. Please know we already updated the steps shared on this thread to ensure accuracy of instructions.


I’m adding a link to help with your future tasks. It contains resources to guide you on how to perform each one in QBO.


Feel free to visit the Community again if you have any other concerns or questions. I’ll be right here to answer them for you. Have a good one.

pcho
Level 1

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

Can you tell me how the discount feature can be turned on for QB desktop?

 

Thank you

Jovychris_A
Moderator

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

You won't have to turn on this feature, @pcho.

 

Simply create a discount item in the Item List and then you can apply this to your sales invoice that requires a discount.

 

Let me show you how:

  1. Go to the Lists menu and then select Item List.
  2. Click the Item button at the bottom of the Item List window.
  3. Select Type, then choose Discount.
  4. Type a name to identify the discount and provide a discount description.
  5. Type the rate or fixed dollar amount in the "Amount of %" field. Type a percentage with the "%" field after the number or you may leave this field blank and apply the percent or fixed amount into the invoice.
  6. Select the income account for the applied discount. and enter other details.
  7. Click OK.

Then you can apply the discount on a sales invoice. I've added a screenshot as your reference.

 

If you want to apply a discount against all items, you can create a Subtotal type item list and add it as a line item on an invoice.

 

Here's how:

  1. In the Item List window, click Item and then select New.
  2.  Choose Type, choose Subtotal.
  3. Click OK.

 

Then you can follow the screenshot below on how subtotaling all items apply the discount against all items in the invoice.

 

I've added a reference for more information about adding discounts in your sales forms: Create an invoice in QuickBooks Desktop.

 

If you want to edit the items in the list, you can reference this article for the detailed steps: Add, edit, and delete items.

 

Feel free to place a comment if you have additional questions. I'll be right here to help. More power to you with your business!

DispatchEra
Level 2

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

How do you do this though for multiple invoices on one payment. We have a customer who pays through CASS and ever invoice has small quick pay discount. they will pay 31k which is 50+ invoices at a time each invoice will have a discount of .5 % so $3-5 dollars off of each invoice. it already takes forever to enter these payments because you cant sort the receive payments screen so invoices are all out of order but now entering each discount is impossible. The QuickPay discount varies so I cant set up a standard discount. 

Nicole_N
QuickBooks Team

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

Hi, @DispatchEra

Thanks for sharing your concern here in the Community. I understand how essential it is for you to add discounts to multiple invoices on one payment. Please know that we can only add a discount item directly to the invoice. You can do that by creating a discount item in the Item List and then you can apply this to your sales invoice that requires a discount.

You can utilize the steps shared by my colleague, Jovychris_A

For more information, you may refer to this article: Use discount and subtotal items on an Invoice. 

I'm also adding this article if you want to learn more about how to add, edit, and delete items in QuickBooks Desktop.

Let me know if you have any other questions about adding discounts in QuickBooks. I'm always here to help. Take care and have a nice day!

DispatchEra
Level 2

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

this is no help at all. This will take forever to enter all of these individually. Why can the receive payments screen not allow discount to be entered under the discount column ? this is another reasons I really dislike quickbooks it is not user friendly at all. 

MJoy_D
Moderator

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

Thank you for getting back to us, @DispatchEra.

 

In QuickBooks Desktop, the placement of your discount item determines how your discount is applied. It can be based on the item or items above. For more information about adding a discount for single or multiple items, check out this article: Use discount and subtotal items on an Invoice

 

Adding it to multiple invoices in a single payment will surely save you time. I invite you to provide input to our developers so that this feature can be added to future releases. Rest assured, I'll do the same on my end.

 

Here's how:

 

  1. Select Send Feedback Online from the Help menu.
  2. Click the Product Suggestion from the drop-down menu.
  3. Fill out the on-screen instructions in the QuickBooks Feedback window.
  4. After that, click Send Feedback.

 If you process customer payments using QuickBooks Payments, check out the following article for more information about how long it takes to get customer payments in your bank account: Find out when QuickBooks Payments deposits customer payments

 

Please let me know if you have any other queries concerning discounts in your invoices. I'm always happy to lend a hand in any way I can. Enjoy the rest of your day!

Hey26
Level 1

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

Why does QB says not to use this item for early pmt disc. and you say yes? see attached, thanks.

hugob
Level 2

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

On QB online this feature has to be done at the invoice level. If you have a customer that pays you for 50 invoices you will need to go into each of those 50 invoices and apply the early discount. Afterwards you go to receive payments and apply the check to those invoices. 

 

This method is time consuming and QB knows about it since I have sent request for the last 5 years without any type of response or at least making these changes to QB online. 

 

QB desktop has a great feature that allows you to apply early pay discount at the "receive payments" window.

 

QB online was not designed to accept multiple payments from one customer with multiple invoices. 

DanaM12
Level 1

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

If I discount each invoice to apply the early payment terms, does it lower my monthly sales? I believe that my monthly sales number was lowered due to the customer receiving an early pay discount. Is this true? Any way around it? 

JanbonN
QuickBooks Team

How do i account for early payment discount on customer invoices, so not to leave an outstanding balance?

Thanks for joining the thread, @DanaM12. Yes, discounting your invoices will lower your monthly sales.

 

It's important to note that offering discounts to your customers will affect your monthly sales figures, as a portion of the sales will be categorized as discounts given and recorded in the Discounts Given income account. 

 

If you want to avoid reducing your sales figures, you may consider providing credits to your customers instead of discounts. However, I strongly recommend consulting with an accountant to ensure this approach aligns with your business structure.

 

Additionally, running a detailed financial report provides a comprehensive overview of your business' status. 

 

Please return to this thread if you have other concerns with your discounts. We'll be here to help you in any way we can.

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