About project invoicing

In Visma.net ERP, you perform project invoicing by using one of the following windows:

• In the Projects (PM301000) window, you can run invoicing for the selected project by clicking Run project invoicing in the window toolbar.
  If the project is pending invoicing, the system creates an invoice with a date that is the same as the Next invoicing date of the project.
  For projects with the On demand invoicing period, the date of the invoice is the business date.
• In the Run project invoicing (PM503000) window, you can run invoicing for multiple projects that are pending invoicing, depending on the Invoice date selected in the top part of the window.
  The system creates invoices with a date that is the same as the Invoice date.
  

In both windows, the system invoices only a project that is pending invoicing or at least one of the following exist for the project:

• A non-invoiced transaction that is ready to be invoiced on the invoice date or the date of the transaction is not later than the invoice date.

  The invoice date is the date of the invoice that the system creates during the invoicing.
  
  The invoice date depends on the window where you run invoicing as follows:

  • In the Projects (PM301000) window, the invoice date is the Next invoicing date, which is specified on the Summary tab, for all the projects except those that are invoiced on demand.
  • In the Projects (PM301000) window, the invoice date is the business date for all the projects for which the Invoicing period, which is specified on the Summary tab, is On demand.
  • In the Run project invoicing (PM503000) window, the invoice date is the Invoice date, which in specified in the top part of the window.

  Whether the system uses or not the transactions with the date is equal to the invoice date depends on the Invoicing cut-off date setting in the Project accounting preferences (PM101000) window as follows:

  • Include trans. created on invoicing date:
    
    With this setting, the non-invoiced transaction is ready to be invoiced if its date is earlier than or the same as the invoice date.
  • Exclude trans. created on invoicing date:
    
    With this setting, the non-invoiced transaction is ready to be invoiced if its date is earlier than the invoice date.
• A revenue budget line with a non-zero pending invoice amount on the Revenue budget tab of the Projects (PM301000) window.
• An amount postponed to the next invoicing from a pro forma invoice for which the corresponding sales invoice is released.
• A task with a recurring invoicing item.

The invoicing procedure depends on the type of a step of the invoicing rule, which is specified for a project task on the Tasks tab of the Projects (PM301000) window, as follows:

• For the Time and material steps of the invoicing rules of project tasks, the system selects all the outstanding allocated project transactions and generates an invoice for the customer based on these transactions and according to the invoicing rule (for details about invoicing rules, see the section below).
  If you do not want to invoice any of the transactions, you can use the Reverse non-invoiced transactions (PM505000) window to reverse allocated transactions (either all listed transactions at once or only the selected ones).
• For the Progress invoicing steps of the invoicing rules of project tasks whose processing does not involve allocations, the system generates an invoice with the invoiceable project revenue, meaning the revenue budget lines with a non-zero Pending invoice amount listed on the Revenue budget tab of the Projects (PM301000) window.

For the invoicing process for a project to be run successfully, the project should meet the following criteria:

• All the mandatory settings are for the project and its tasks.
• The project status is be Active, Completed, or Suspended.
• The status of the project tasks is Active or Completed, and the invoicing rule should be specified for these tasks.
• The project has a provision for invoicing or a non-invoiced project transaction associated with the task within this invoicing period for a time and material invoicing.
• The steps of the invoicing rule should be applicable to the invoicing provisions.
  For example: The invoicing rule of a task that is supposed to be invoiced by a revenue budget line should have a Progress invoicing step.

For each project task, the invoicing process is defined by invoicing rules, which are defined in the Invoicing rules (PM207000) window.
For each invoicing rule, you can create steps of the following types:

• A single Progress invoicing step to invoice pending invoice amounts
• Multiple Time and material steps to invoice transactions by different account groups

In a single invoicing rule, you can mix these types of invoicing steps, as well as create separate invoicing rules for each type of step.

Each step of a invoicing rule has a variety of settings that depend on the step type, including the following:

• The account group that is used as a filter to select the transactions for invoicing by the Time and material invoicing steps.
  
  The system selects all the transactions that are due for invoicing when the invoicing procedure is run.
  
  Normally, you use for invoicing the same account group or groups that you use for accumulating the unrecognised revenue.
  
  By running invoicing for these account groups, you recognise the revenue.
• Formulas to define the description of the invoice and each invoice line.
• Formulas to calculate the amount and quantity of the invoice lines created by the Time and material invoicing steps.
  
• The sources of the sales account and the destination branch for each invoice line.

  The invoicing process uses the originating branch from the project settings in the Projects (PM301000) window and the destination branches from the sources according to the invoicing rules. When a sales invoice is released, the customer ledger account is updated under the originating branch of the invoice, while the revenue amounts are recorded to the destination branches of the invoice lines.

• The invoice group to make the system create separate invoices for particular steps with the similar invoice group during the project invoicing (either pro forma invoices or sales invoices, depending on the invoicing workflow of the project).
  
  During the invoicing process, the system groups the invoiceable amounts into invoices by the following:
  • The invoice group of the steps of the invoicing rules to which the project tasks refer
  • The customer
  • The customer location
  • The Invoice separately setting of each project task defined in the Project tasks (PM302000) window
• Non-invoiceable transactions that do not contribute to the amount invoiced to the customer and that you may decide to include in the invoice.
• Grouping criteria by date, employee, supplier, and stock item for the invoice lines created by the Time and material invoicing steps.

Progress invoicing is a simple invoicing workflow for the projects that are gradually invoiced at a fixed contract amount.

Progress invoicing does not involve project transactions, and the system uses Progress invoicing steps of invoicing rules of the project tasks to process this invoicing.

The project setup and the invoicing workflow proceed as follows:

• You add a revenue budget line with a Revised amount to a project on the Revenue budget tab of the Projects (PM301000) window.
• To provide a invoiceable amount (for example, on a monthly basis), you populate the Pending invoice amount or Completed (%) column on the Revenue budget tab for the revenue budget lines to make the system calculate the Pending invoice amount.
• You run the project invoicing process to create a pro forma invoice (or a sales invoice, depending on the selected workflow).
• The system creates an invoice with the amounts derived from the Pending invoice amount column of the Revenue budget tab of the Projects (PM301000) window for the revenue budget lines. The system updates the Draft invoices amount of the revenue budget lines with the Pending invoice amount and clears the Pending invoice amount.
• If the system creates a pro forma invoice (depending on the selected workflow), the invoice lines that are produced by the progress invoicing steps are displayed on the Progress invoicing tab of the Pro forma invoices (PM307000) window.

This invoicing workflow is provided for projects that are invoiced based on project transactions.
The system uses the Time and material steps of the invoicing rules of the project tasks to process this invoicing.
A invoicing rule may have a number of Time and material steps for different account groups of transactions that should be used to determine the invoiced amounts by different formulas.
The Time and material invoicing can be executed right after the project transactions that match the selection criteria have been provisioned in the system.
The allocation process can be executed before invoicing, if necessary.

The project setup and invoicing workflow proceeds as follows:

• You run the project invoicing process to create a pro forma invoice (or a sales invoice, depending on the selected workflow).
• The system creates the invoice based on the non-invoiced project transactions with amounts calculated by the invoicing rules of the project tasks.

  The system considers in the invoicing the transactions with a date that is earlier than the invoicing date and does not consider the transactions with the date that is later than the invoicing date. The transactions with a date on the invoicing date are invoiced if Include trans. created on invoicing date is selected as the Invoicing cut-off date in the Project accounting preferences (PM101000) window.

• If the system creates a pro forma invoice, the invoice lines that are produced by the Time and material invoicing steps are displayed on the Time and material tab of the Pro forma invoices (PM307000) window.

Your company may provide services to customers regularly for a flat price.
For instance, you can lease construction machines to customers for an agreed number of hours per month for a fixed price.
If you decide to manage this activity as a project, you do not have to manually create a new invoice every month—each time you run project invoicing, recurring transactions are added to the invoice (or to the invoice listed first in the rule if multiple invoices must be generated for the invoicing rule).

Recurring invoicing is a task-level setting you define on the Recurring invoicing tab of the Project tasks (PM302000) window.
You can use non-stock items as line items for recurring invoicing to track employee and equipment work time. For each item, you can specify the following:

• The flat price charged once each invoicing period.
• The number of units included in the item fee. For instance, you may have an agreement with the customer to provide 40 hours of road scraper work at a flat price, while any extra hours are charged on a per-hour basis.
• The option that determines whether the number of units included in the flat price is to be reset for each invoicing period or it is a fixed number for the entire project duration.
  
• The minimum number of units for which invoicing may be performed.
  If the amount of services or products you provide is less than this value, you do not charge the customer.
  

The invoicing period is a project-wide setting that you specify when planning the project at the level of the project template in the Project templates (PM208000) window.
The following options are available: Week, Month, Quarter, Year, or On demand.
The On demand option defines the invoicing that may be initiated when it is needed.

With the draft invoice workflow, a user can modify a pro forma invoice and postpone the difference until the next invoicing.
This remaining amount will be invoiced during the next invoicing if the sales invoice that contains the line from which the remainder originates is released.
For more information about the draft invoice workflow, see: About pro forma invoices

When you run a invoicing procedure for a project, the system may generate additional transactions, for instance, to include a discount or freight charge.
Such transactions are automatically associated with the project, but you may also need to automatically associate these transactions with specific tasks in the project.

You can have Visma.net ERP automatically assign transactions to specific tasks by mapping specific general ledger accounts to tasks within the project in the Default task for General ledger account section on the General ledger accounts tab of the Projects (PM301000) window.
Once you map a general ledger account to a task, any transactions automatically generated by the system and associated with the account will be linked to this default task.

In the Reverse non-invoiced transactions (PM505000) window, you have two reversal options:

• To reverse specific transactions, select the check box before each line you want to reverse, and click Process.
• To reverse all transactions in the list, just click Process all.