Collaborate on Invoice Terms and Conditions Wording Examples for Accounting and Tax with Ease Using airSlate SignNow

Invoice terms and conditions wording examples for Accounting and Tax

you've just completed some work and now you want to get paid it's time to send your client an invoice but what exactly is an invoice how do you make one what should go on it and why is it important let's start with what is an invoice in a nutshell an invoice is a financial document that requests payment a seller sends an invoice to a buyer in order to get paid for the goods and services the seller has provided an invoice can be given to the buyer at any time but it is usually given soon before or soon after the goods or services have been provided an invoice can be called a sales invoice A supplier invoice and a purchase invoice all three terms refer to the same document but the difference lies in who is referring to the invoice so a seller would commonly call it a sales invoice while the buyer would call it a purchase or supplier invoice if you are the seller there are a few different ways you can create invoices to send to your clients the oldest method that some people still use today is paper invoices they usually come in a pad that you would buy from a stationary store and you need to fill them in by hand and give them to your customers by post or in person of course these days there are much more modern ways of creating and sending invoices if you use bookkeeping software such as xero or freshbooks you can create invoices in the system and email them to your customers these systems usually have built-in invoice templates so you can easily create professional looking invoices to suit your brand if you don't use bookkeeping software you can use invoice templates in programs such as Microsoft Excel or word Google Sheets or docs or Graphics programs such as canva you can also send invoices from payment services such as PayPal or stripe so now that you know what invoices are and how to create them what exactly should you put on them while there is no set format for invoices as a general rule the more information you put on them the better this is because an invoice is a record of what you are owed and can be used as proof that an agreed service or goods were provided it can also be used as a record of a transaction which you may need for some reason such as a tax audit so here is a list of some of the information you may like to include on your invoices your logo or branding buyer and seller contact details a unique invoice number the invoice creation date the due date of payment and the terms for example net 30 days the description quantity rate and amount of each goods and services provided any discounts you've given a subtotal and a sales tax that may be included any credits any part payments already made for example through a deposit the total due and of course how they can pay you for example bpay or bank transfer you should also keep in mind that depending on where you live you may need to include other information on your invoices for example in Australia invoices may need to include the Australian business number or ABN of the seller and a clear indication of the amount of any goods and services tax or GST that is included so as you can see an invoice is an important document that can contain a lot of information but despite this it's important to note that in some countries and regions an invoice is not the same as a contract this means you cannot simply give an invoice to someone and expect them to pay because as you can imagine if you could do that people could write invoices and demand money so in other words an invoice cannot be used as a legally binding contract but typically they can be used as evidence in court if there are disputes between the buyer and seller what you need to do is ensure you have a legal agreement with the buyer before you provide them with any goods or services this can be done by using a different document during the purchasing process such as a quote or a purchase order for more information on purchase orders quotes and other documents used in the purchasing process check out our videos so thanks for watching and I hope you learned everything you need to know about invoices