Disable duplicate invoice numbers

Hi Andrulis!

Thanks for connecting with the QuickBooks Community! I will be delighted to assist! Here's how to turn on and off custom transaction numbers that may be affecting your invoice numbers:

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1. Go to Settings ⚙, then select Account and settings.
2. Select Sales.
3. In Sales form content, select Edit ✎.
4. Turn Custom transaction numbers on or off.
5. Select Save, then select Done.

Give it a go, and let me know if you are still experiencing the issue. For more information about this, feel free to review the article below.
 

• Custom transaction numbers to sales forms in QuickBooks Online
   

 I will be around to help! Take care. 
 

Apologies if the question is worded confusingly. We do have the custom transaction number setting enabled, which is how we use our own invoice numbers. The issue is that Quickbooks allows for us to use an already used/duplicated invoice number.

Example: Employee John is creating an invoice and enters 123 as the invoice number. However an invoice with the number 123 already exists. John would have no indication that he used an already used invoice number. How can this be prevented? We cannot find a setting in Quickbooks Online to warn if a duplicate invoice # is used. We have found a setting for enabling a warning message if a duplicate check, bill, or journal number is used but no luck for invoices.

Let's make sure you'll be prompted if invoices are created in duplicates, Adrulis.

After you've turned on the custom transactions numbers of your sales forms, and when you create a duplicate invoice, you'll get a prompt telling you to confirm if you still need to use the invoice number. This is a built-in functionality in QuickBooks Online (QBO). I've added a screenshot below for your reference:

Furthermore, learn how you can set up your account so customers can pay online invoice. For more information, consider checking this out for your guide: Take And Process Payments In QuickBooks Online With QuickBooks Payments. 

Please let me know if you're referring to something else or if there's anything else that you want to clarify. The Community is always right here to help you anytime. 

Yes, how can we disable users from clicking yes on that screen? We do not want the possibility of using an invoice number twice, and that is a risk having the option to as your screenshot shows.

I appreciate you getting back to the thread, Andrulis.

As mentioned by my colleague, enabling custom transaction numbers will trigger a prompt for duplicate invoice numbers. With this, users can always choose to use the same transaction number or not. However, controlling users from confirming to utilize the repeated number is unavailable.

Indeed, preventing users from selecting the Yes option to avoid utilizing duplicate invoice numbers is also a great idea. Hence, I recommend sending feedback directly to our product development team. They might incorporate your suggestions when working with future product updates to improve customer experience when dealing with invoices.

Here's how:

1. Head to the Gear icon.
2. Select Feedback.
3. Share your product improvement ideas.
4. Click Next to submit.

You can stay updated with your product requests by visiting this website: Customer Feedback for QuickBooks Online.

Moreover, consider reviewing these resources for guidance once you're ready to enter customer payments and if you decide to personalize your forms to improve business communication:

• Record invoice payments in QuickBooks Online
• Customize invoices, estimates, and sales receipts in QuickBooks Online

Please keep us posted if you have additional questions when managing your invoices or other related concerns in QuickBooks Online. We're always around to help.

The Pop Up prompt has not been popping up for my staff and I for the past month which has caused numerous duplicate invoices. We have over 15 employees creating hundreds of invoices daily and this has caused a mess. Please advise why the Pop Up prompting us of a duplicate number has not been working

Hello, mpillet78.

Let me share some insights, on why you're unable to see the prompt.

Sometimes, browsing data can build up and stop you from creating invoices. For now, I suggest using a private window to help find the problem, since it won't save any extra files.

In the meantime, you may perform basic troubleshooting to determine if the issue is related to your browser. To begin, please open an incognito window to prevent your browsing history from being saved. You can use the following keyboard shortcuts based on what type of browser you're using:

To open an incognito window, you can follow these keyboard shortcuts:

• Press keys: Ctrl + Shift + P (Mozilla Firefox & Microsoft Edge browser)
• Press keys: Ctrl + Shift + N (Google Chrome browser)
• Press keys: Command + Shift + N (Safari browser)
•  

If you find a duplicate invoice in QuickBooks Online, you can void or delete it. You can delete duplicate invoices manually in QBO. I can guide you through the steps to delete a duplicate invoice.

Here's  how:

1. Find and open the duplicate invoice.
2. Click More at the bottom.
3. Select Delete.
4. Click Yes.

Feel free to explore this article for more information on how to delete invoices and other transactions: How to void or delete an invoice or other transactions.

For future reference, you'll be able to find more information about reconciling accounts in the following article: Reconcile an account in QuickBooks Online

Feel free to reach out if you have any further questions regarding your invoices or any other related issues in QuickBooks Online. We're here to assist you anytime.

You are misunderstanding.  The duplicate invoices cannot just be deleted.  They are being sent to separate customers because the system has stopped working to let us know an invoice number has been used.   If the duplicates were being sent to the same customer, of course you could delete it.  That is not what is happening, and we are in the same boat!  This was working 2 weeks ago, but has now stopped working without cause.  We NEED THIS TO BE FIXED!!!  IT IS MESSING UP OUR BOOKS!

I appreciate you letting us know and clarifying your concern here in Community, @Asteinour.

Please know that this issue about QuickBooks Online (QBO) not notifying us when a duplicate invoice number is used has been reported to our product engineers.

If you performed the browser troubleshooting steps provided by my colleague, I suggest contacting our QBO Support team to add you to the list of affected users. This way, you'll get a notification once the issue is resolved.

Here's how:

1. Go to Help (?).
2. Click on Search, then Contact Us.
3. Choose a specific topic or Ask about something else. Type in a short description in the box provided.
4. Select to Chat with us or get a Callback to connect with us.

If you want to mark the invoice as paid, please refer to this article: Record invoice payments in QuickBooks Online.

Should you require further assistance with your invoices or other QuickBooks-related concerns, drop by again so we can get back to you promptly.

Thank you Mario for responding to my email.  I appreciate your feedback.  Unfortunately, we have been on and off support chat and by phone for the past week and a half getting different answers.  We were told that this is the way QB is supposed to run (but it did before 2 weeks ago), we were told that it was our fault, that we did something inadvertently, then we were told that no, there are quite a few other people expressing the same issues.  We finally got in contact with a support person through our accountant, and he responded that it will be fixed, but he doesn't know when because not enough people have expressed issues with it, so the engineering team will not work on it as a priority until they get further complaints. 

This is unacceptable.  We are paying a monthly fee for a service we that does not work for us.  We invoice hundreds of invoices a week to many customers, and we cannot have the same invoice number going to separate customers.  When we get paid, it will be a nightmare trying to accept payment and it will reek havoc on our books!  We need this warning pop-up back now.  We have taken every avenue we know of to get some answers, and have been stonewalled at every turn.  We were told to move from Quickbooks desktop to online, but desktop was so much more user friendly.  We used it for 10 years with no issues.  The online version has been a nightmare!

After dealing with customer service by chat and phone for over a week, we contacted the CEO of the company.  We got an immediate answer and the problem was fixed within 24 hours.  I hope everyone who was having this issue has gotten it corrected as well.  Customer service needs to be trained better and not to just repeat their textbook answers.  This should not have taken this long to correct, and we should not have had to find a way to get to the top to have it done.  I thank the engineer profusely, who got this corrected as quickly as he did!

If you disable this function -  Would it affect Vendor Reference numbers?

I too, had the same issue with Customer Support.

First, it took me an hour just to get someone on the phone.

Their solution was for me to enter an alpha character after the system generated invoice number.

Seriously?

May I ask what the fix was?

There was nothing we could do on our end.  The Engineers had to fix it. It was fixed within 24 hours.

We got in touch with the office of the President and they immediately got an engineer to fix our problem.  We had been told by customer support that not enough people had complained of this problem, so the engineers would not make it a priority.  

Would you happen to have that phone number handy?   

Would you happen to have that phone number handy??