--- title: Quote → SO → Invoice → Payment → Deposit description: "**Audience:** bookkeeper · **Last updated:** 2026-05-19 · [Edit on GitHub](https://github.com/phreesoft/bizuno/edit/main/docs/03-daily-workflows/01-quote-so-invoice-payment-deposit.md) # Quote → SO → Invoice → Payment → Deposit The single most common workflow in any small-business book: convince a customer to buy, sell to them, get paid, and…" url: "https://www.bizuno.com/docs/quote-so-invoice-payment-deposit/" updated: "2026-06-18" category: Daily Workflows --- # Quote → SO → Invoice → Payment → Deposit **Audience:** bookkeeper · **Last updated:** 2026-05-19 · [Edit on GitHub](https://github.com/phreesoft/bizuno/edit/main/docs/03-daily-workflows/01-quote-so-invoice-payment-deposit.md) # Quote → SO → Invoice → Payment → Deposit The single most common workflow in any small-business book: convince a customer to buy, sell to them, get paid, and bank the money. Bizuno breaks it into four (sometimes five) journal entries. This page walks the full happy path, names every journal type that fires, and shows what hits the General Ledger at each step. If you only ever learn one Bizuno workflow, learn this one — half of every other workflow in the system is a variation on it. --- ## The full cycle at a glance ``` ┌─────────┐ convert ┌─────────┐ convert ┌─────────┐ │ Quote │ ──────────▶ │ Sales │ ──────────▶ │ Sales │ │ jID=9 │ │ Order │ │Invoice │ └─────────┘ │ jID=10 │ │ jID=12 │ └─────────┘ └────┬────┘ │ apply payment ▼ ┌─────────┐ │ Cash │ │ Receipt │ │ jID=18 │ └────┬────┘ │ (optional, if you use undeposited funds) ▼ ┌─────────┐ │ Bank │ │ Deposit │ │ jID=2 │ └─────────┘ ``` You can enter the cycle at any node — most businesses skip the Quote (and sometimes the SO) for repeat customers and jump straight to Invoice. --- ## Step 1 — Sales Quote (jID=9) **What it is.** A non-binding offer to a customer. *No General Ledger impact*. Inventory isn't reserved. Tax isn't accrued. It's a record-keeping formality that buys you traceability ("the customer agreed to this price last Tuesday"). **Where in the UI.** *Customers → Sales Quotes → New*. **When to use it.** B2B sales where the customer needs an itemized quote to get internal approval. Long enough to expire (set the terminal date). **When to skip it.** Walk-up retail, repeat customers on standing terms, service businesses that quote verbally. --- ## Step 2 — Sales Order (jID=10) **What it is.** A commitment-on-paper that the customer wants what's on the quote (or what they verbally asked for, if you skipped the quote). *No GL impact yet* — inventory still belongs to you, AR isn't created. **What changes vs. the quote.** Inventory is **soft-reserved** for the order (the "Unshipped Orders" dashboard widget counts SO commitments against quantity-on-hand). Some workflows route the SO to a fulfillment queue. **Recurring orders.** SOs support the `recur_id` chain — a single SO can project itself forward weekly/monthly/quarterly, creating future-dated copies that auto-invoice when their post date arrives. See [Recurring invoices and POs](/docs/recurring-invoices-and-pos/). **Where in the UI.** *Customers → Sales Orders → New*, or "Convert to SO" from an existing quote. **When to skip.** Cash-and-carry sales, services billed immediately on completion, internet orders that ship same-day. --- ## Step 3 — Sales Invoice (jID=12) **What it is.** The transaction that **actually books revenue**. This is where the GL gets touched. Bizuno builds the invoice from the SO's lines (if there was an SO) or from scratch. **GL impact (typical):** | Line | Debit | Credit | | --- | --- | --- | | AR booking | Accounts Receivable | — | | Revenue line(s) | — | Sales Revenue (per item) | | Sales tax (if any) | — | Sales Tax Collected | | COGS (per item) | Cost of Goods Sold | — | | Inventory relief | — | Inventory | A $1,000 invoice for a single item with $80 cost and 8% sales tax posts: ``` Dr Accounts Receivable 1,080.00 Cr Sales Revenue 1,000.00 Cr Sales Tax Collected 80.00 Dr Cost of Goods Sold 80.00 Cr Inventory 80.00 ``` **Inventory comes off the shelf permanently at this step.** The soft reservation from the SO becomes a hard reduction in `inventory_history`. **Where in the UI.** *Customers → Sales (Invoice) → New*, or convert from an SO. **Recurring invoices.** Like SOs, invoices support `recur_id` for subscriptions, retainers, and standing service charges. --- ## Step 4 — Cash Receipt (jID=18) **What it is.** The customer paid. You record it against their open invoice(s). **GL impact:** | Line | Debit | Credit | | --- | --- | --- | | Cash in | Bank account *(or Undeposited Funds — see below)* | — | | AR relief | — | Accounts Receivable | A $1,080 payment received via check posts: ``` Dr Checking Account 1,080.00 (or Undeposited Funds) Cr Accounts Receivable 1,080.00 ``` **Partial payments are normal.** Apply $500 against a $1,080 invoice and the invoice's `balance_due` becomes $580. Apply another payment later to clear it. **Cross-invoice payments are normal.** One check from a customer can clear five open invoices in one Cash Receipt entry. **Overpayments and credits.** Apply more than the open balance and Bizuno creates a customer-credit-on-file. Use it against a future invoice. **Where in the UI.** *Customers → Cash Receipts → New*. --- ## Step 5 — Bank Deposit (jID=2, optional) This step **only applies if your bookkeeping uses an "Undeposited Funds" holding account.** The pattern: - During the day, customer payments post `Dr Undeposited Funds, Cr AR` - At end-of-day or end-of-week, you take physical checks to the bank - Record a General Journal entry (jID=2) that moves the total deposited amount from Undeposited Funds to the actual bank account: ``` Dr Checking Account 5,432.10 Cr Undeposited Funds 5,432.10 ``` This pattern matches the deposit slip the bank gives you — one Bizuno journal entry per physical deposit, so the reconcile-to-bank-statement step has one line per deposit slip. **If you don't use Undeposited Funds**, payments post directly to the bank account in Step 4 and there's no Step 5. This is simpler but makes bank reconciliation harder (the bank shows one deposit while your books show ten individual receipts). Most bookkeepers learn to love Undeposited Funds within a month of starting it. --- ## Common variations ### Skip quote and SO; invoice directly Walk-in customer pays at the register, repeat customer on standing terms. Just create the Invoice (jID=12) and you're done. The GL impact is identical to the full cycle. ### Cash sale (skip AR entirely) Use **Point of Sale** (jID=19) instead of an invoice. POS combines the invoice and receipt into one transaction: ``` Dr Cash 108.00 Cr Sales Revenue 100.00 Cr Sales Tax Collected 8.00 Dr COGS 80.00 Cr Inventory 80.00 ``` No AR is created; no Cash Receipt step is needed. Used for retail checkout flows. ### Partial payment / payment plan Cash Receipt (Step 4) accepts any amount up to the open balance. Repeat as needed. The invoice stays open in *Customers → Aged AR* until fully paid. ### Pre-payment / customer deposit on a future order Record a Cash Receipt against the customer (not against a specific invoice). Bizuno creates a customer-credit balance. Later, when you invoice them, apply the credit at invoice time so the invoice is born already paid. ### Customer credit on file from a return A Credit Memo (jID=13) reduces AR. If the customer overpaid or returned goods, the credit memo creates a negative-AR balance that follows them forward — apply it to the next invoice. --- ## Reading aged AR After running this cycle for a while, *Customers → Aged AR* shows you who owes what: | Bucket | Meaning | | --- | --- | | Current | Not yet due (within terms) | | 1–30 | 1–30 days past due | | 31–60 | Worth a polite phone call | | 61–90 | Worth a sterner phone call | | 90+ | Time to make a decision (collections?) | The bucket boundaries come from the invoice's terms minus today. They're configurable in *Settings → PhreeBooks → Aging*. --- ## Common gotchas - **A "save" on a quote/SO does NOT post to GL.** People assume it must, panic when they see no balance change. That's correct — GL only moves at invoice time. - **Editing a posted invoice does NOT automatically re-post GL.** Bizuno unposts and re-posts under the hood; if the edit changes amounts/items, the GL legs change too. Trust the process; verify with a register view. - **"I created the invoice but the customer never paid" — leave the invoice open.** Don't delete it. Either issue a credit memo (preserves audit trail) or write off via journal entry when you're sure it's bad debt. - **The "Deposit Slips" feature in *Banking* is just a report** over the Undeposited Funds account. It doesn't create journal entries by itself — you still record the deposit as the Step 5 General Journal. --- ## Related - [The journal_id taxonomy](/docs/journal-id-taxonomy/) — the full set of journal IDs involved here - [Sale with partial backorder](/docs/sale-with-partial-backorder/) — when you can't ship everything on the SO at once - [Returns and credit memos](/docs/returns-and-credit-memos/) — the reverse cycle - [Recurring invoices and POs](/docs/recurring-invoices-and-pos/) — automating the cycle for repeat business - [Multi-currency invoice and GL settlement](/docs/multi-currency-and-gl-settlement/) — the cycle when the customer pays in a foreign currency