Can I Create a custom report to show customer account transaction detail? I invoice a retainer and then bill against it as I complete the work. Having this detail I can see what customer balances are?
Two features should give you what you want. The first is just to look at the Customers tab listing. Credits and receivables show. The second is to generate a customer statement under Reports. Select Transactions for the statement type.
Thanks Tut I appreciate it. I am new and have been looking at all of the acct’g software programs out there. I see that the developer takes input from users. Nobody has a simple entry for Customer Deposits for “unearned sales” . Putting a deposit/ retainer on account is becoming very popular. Anyone who sells a “knowledge” based service like I do must work from a retainer. If Manager IO could develop a separate type of invoice called Customer Deposits (Unearned) that when you invoice the customer it posts to a Liability account & A/R. Then when you apply payment it posts to A/R & Bank Acct. Then when you complete the work (Earn $) you charge the customer’s account with the ability to post the amount against the customer deposit invoice for the amount earned going to Sales & the balance stays in Liability account. Then have a Customer report that shows transaction detail by customer. It can be done with Mgr IO & Qbooks but takes like 6 regular entries & 2 JE’s - too many entries for me because of time and errors in entry. plus I use paypal which is a new can of worms.
That cannot happen, because an account receivable is an asset, whereas a customer deposit is a liability. The two just don’t mix.
There a several ways around this with Manager (or other programs). If your customer requires a sales invoice before they will pay you the retainer, create one, allocating the line item to a liability account you create with a name like Prepaid income and deposits. When they pay, Receive Money against the sales invoice, which will clear it. But to keep track of whose money it is, immediately create a journal entry debiting the prepaid account and crediting Customer credits (with the customer’s subaccount). Thus, the prepaid account is merely a temporary holding account and usually has a zero balance. As actual work is done, create another sales invoice, to which Manager will automatically apply customer credits and show any balance due. (Billable Time works great for that.) I have previously suggested to @lubos that he add the availability of Customer credits directly to the sales invoice creation process, which would eliminate the need for the journal entry.
Another method is to use a sales quote and ask the customer to pay the retainer against it, if they will. That will not create an account receivable. When they pay, you can allocate the payment directly to Customer credits. No journal entry is required. And there is no need for the prepaid deposit holding account, even for short intervals. A variation on this approach is to simply incorporate payment of the retainer into your proposal or contract and keep it entirely out of Manager until they pay the money. Then Receive Money to Customer credits.
Actually, it is not so bad. The first approach I’ve outlined require a sales invoice, receipt of retainer, journal entry, 2nd sales invoice, and receipt of final payment (5 total steps). The second approach requires a sales quote, receipt of retainer, sales invoice, and receipt of payment (4 steps). The last variation calls only for a receipt of retainer, sales invoice, and receipt of final payment (3 steps). I don’t know how you could do it with fewer with any program.