Welcome, finance expert! You are the person in charge of the invoicing process within your company, and you always keep a vigilant eye on the finances. In this guide, we will take you through all the steps of the financial aspects of Rentman.
Discover how to make invoices, how to integrate your accounting software with Rentman, and all the other processes you need on a daily basis. You will find links in this guide that lead you to more information about the described topics.
If you get lost or stuck at some point in the process, don't worry - our support team is here to help you. In the bottom right corner of your screen, you will find a 'help' button to contact one of the support agents. They will be happy to assist you!
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Modules required
- dashboard Dashboard
- table_chart Projects
- Invoices
- settings Configuration
First things first, make sure you are logged into Rentman.
As an essential part of your company, we want to help you with optimizing your work processes Let’s discover how that works and what the best workflows are.
In case you are also responsible for setting up work processes, you can find a helpful guide in the Rentman Academy! Find out how to implement taxes, payment methods, invoice numbers, and much more: Rentman Academy - Implement your financial process.
Create an invoice
In the Implementation phase of the Rentman account, Invoice moments must have been set up. If not, have a look at the step: make sure the customers pay on time. This step is crucial because it helps automate the process, so every project is correctly invoiced. They will determine when a project will show as “to be invoiced” in the Finance module.
In Rentman, the process is fully automated. You don’t need to chase the account managers and ask them if an invoice needs to be created. Depending on the invoice moments, you will have the information available at any time.
How to: Create an invoice
1 - Make sure a project has been created and an invoice moment has been selected. You can either ask an account manager to take care of this step or do it yourself if you have the user rights allowing you to do so.
2 - Go to the Financial module > To be invoiced section. Select a period of time covering the project you have created. You should see it in the list now.
3 - Select the project and click on invoice. This will lead you to the page where you can create the invoice for that specific project. Check all information to make sure it is accurate and click generate. Your document is now created.
You now know what the To be invoiced module is for and how to create an invoice. If you want to take things to the next level and discover how to create partial invoices and penalties for late payments, follow these steps: Creation of the invoice
Customize the design of the invoices
If the look of the documents is determined by someone else, you can skip this entire section.
You have generated an invoice, but you were not fully satisfied by the template you have used. You need to customize the document, so it reflects exactly what you want to communicate to the customer. Have a look at Rentman Academy - Automated creation of documents with document templates to discover how it is done.
What comes after the invoice?
Your invoice is now created but that does not mean the money has been received yet. You need to keep track of this too. Let’s assume the due date of the invoice is dangerously close and the customer has not paid yet. You are worried. However, you remember that the Finance > Invoices module overview shows you what’s going on. You open the invoice details where you see that the status is still open. This confirms that you have not received any payment yet.
This will look similar to this:
4 - You decide to send a payment reminder. Create the document by selecting the invoice and clicking on payment reminder.
Good news - In the rush of the event, they somehow missed your invoice. They apologized and paid the invoice right away.
5 - You can now mark the invoice as paid by selecting the invoice, clicking on more actions and editing the payment status.
6 - Re-open the details, the status must have changed.
Export the invoices to an accounting software
The invoices are now created. Though, keep in mind that Rentman is not an accounting software. You need these data in the actual accounting software so your mission can continue. To do so, there are two ways, depending on the software you use.
How-to: Connect your accounting software to Rentman
I am using either Xero or Quickbooks online
If you use one of these two, this means that an automated export can be done between Rentman and the software you use.
7 - Make sure you are fully aware of which data will be exported and how the set up works. Both are explained, either for Quickbooks online or for Xero.
8 - Go to the settings Configuration module > Account > Extensions and under External extensions, find the software you want to connect and click on “connect”.
9 - Go to the Financial > Invoices module. The export is automated but you want to make sure it all goes smoothly. This is why you also need to keep an eye on the export status of your invoices. To do so, add the column “export status” and eventually “export remark”.
3-bis If you think it takes too much space though, note that the export status is also in the details of the invoices. Open the details by hovering your mouse over the invoice number and have a look.
I am using another accounting software
If you do not use either Xero or Quickbooks online, do not worry, we also have a solution for you. A manual export will be possible, so your ledgers will be exported as a .xlsx (Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets) file.
7 - Read the process explained in this page and follow the instruction step by step to export your invoices.
The Dashboard - keeping a good overview
In order to keep an overview on the invoices and revenues, you need a place where you would instantly see if an action is required and how things are going. The dashboard Dashboard module will be your best ally for this.
You can customize the dashboard to your own needs and display for example your tasks, calendar and an overview of the generated and expected revenue.
How-to: Configure your dashboard
10 - Create a new dashboard and include the open invoices widget and one of the two revenues widgets.
11 - You may not like the layout of the Dashboard so you will need to resize the widgets. Click on Edit Dashboard, move the widgets around and resize them if you like.
The statistics - to go even deeper
How-to: Analyze results with statistics
The statistics will show you how the company is performing. For your role, you will focus on the financial side of the business.
12 - Add a statistic table by clicking on the button + Add statistic
13 - Select a type. The type is what the statistics dashboard you are creating will be about. Which information do you want to see? The type is what will determine this. At this point, we will still focus on invoices, so you will select one of the “Invoices” types.
14 - Name the table and go to the Statistics tab. This is where all data will appear. The table is nice, but you want to add the price including taxes. To do this, you will edit the columns and add the column “Price including taxes/VAT”.
15 - You have all information you need, but this is a bit chaotic. You would like to group your invoices per month and see the total per month. To do this, you will add a column “Invoice > Date” and select the month, only the month. Once it is done, you will need to group that column.
What a great overview you have now!
Signed, sealed, delivered! Now that you understand how to do your daily tasks in Rentman, no invoices will ever escape your control again. Your role is essential and Rentman will help you on a daily basis to make sure you can effortlessly keep an eye on everything.