Amend an invoice will create a new one?

Draft status simply means you haven’t finished preparing the invoice. For example, a junior accountant prepared the invoice but needs a senior to approve it. Another example, Items are entered on the invoice but tax treatment for the invoice is tricky and needs input from a tax consultant; the invoice can be created and left in draft until there is a confirmation of the proper treatment.

Pro forma (Quotation on ERPNext) is different however. Quotations do not touch your general ledger i.e there’s no accounting posting. It is basically a toy invoice because it has no effect on accounting statements.

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To give my two cents:

  1. You need to have a separate identification number for revised invoices that come from customers. The ERPNext method of appending a “-1”, “-2” is the most logical way of distinguishing different versions of the same invoice. If you use the same number, then you’ll have copies with the same invoice number that have different contents, which is completely unacceptable from an audit perspective.
  2. Gaps in the invoice number sequence are not an issue. From my understanding, the rules say you have to have the invoices sequentially numbered. It doesn’t say that you have to have them all submitted to your customer and have them paid. If they are in draft mode, add a comment saying that they are invalid and unsubmitted for whatever reason and move on. If you don’t use it for proforma invoices (use Quotation instead) and don’t use it for disposable invoices (or create another naming series for those documents that aren’t “actual” invoices), you can minimize the “gaps” and should be fine.
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And what happens if the senior, does not approve and is not issued? You have a missing number on an invoice never issued. I reiterate that here (spain) now ALL sales transactions are invoices issued, the tickets in sell at POS are reduced invoices, but invoices at the end.

You are mistakenly believing that we want to change the way things are done now in erpnext, when it is not what we are proposing, quite the contrary, is to maintain this current form and add an option in which the numbering is strict and immutable.

This should be done, as I put it before, choosing at the time of creating the series for invoices if you want to use one type or another.

And they commented on sap, I know sap and navision and both have module for Spanish accounting that just does this, like practically any software that wants to be used here.

This is also about workflow in fact; as mentioned above subordinate prepares and supervisor approves and after approval GL etc. are impacted.
I think, CANCEL can be treated as VOIDED and after CANCEL that document / transaction should be locked to avoid any further modifications and AMEND should not be available at all; the only available thing after CANCEL might be DUPLICATE.
Serial Number would be maintained and there would be a valid reason for sure behind CANCEL and any missing serial numbers can be reported with supporting documents.

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I don’t quite understand what you’re asking for? Right now ERPNext’s numbering system increments numerically. If you’re looking to have the invoice number assigned after submit, that’s a really major change to the system. But, that said, I can’t imagine any country doesn’t accept the concept of a voided invoice, which is effectively what a draft invoice is. Just so long as you keep a record of it, you are keeping your invoices numerically sequential, it’s just that some of them are void.

You can not cancel (if I understand the concept of the void invoice. I understand that it is an incorrect invoice that is canceled, remain in system and is not emited) or delete an invoice.

In these cases you must make a invoice (or more) with the same concept and negative amount, and have a reference by number with original invoice. That is, a credit note or rectificative invoice (as they are now called here). This is because now in spain all sell transactions are invoices, from tickets to credit notes. Is what I try you to make you understand. Is not how we work in my company, is how accounting is working in spain.

I think that are walking on circles in this question. I dont known if understand spanish or have an translator, but this url [1] explain it better the process than me :slight_smile:

And yes, erpnext do a good job numerating the invoices, the problem is the posibility of delete one, modificate an emited, or have void/canceled invoices (i repeat, if i understand well the concept of void invoices).

If i have bad concepts over void invoices or similar processes in invoice’s workflow, please tell me where i can read information about this.

[1] http://www.emprendedores.es/publireportajes/facturacion-contabilidad-empresa-debitoor/como-anular-factura-emitida

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Yes, and at the time collection / receipt entry; that Invoice and Credit Note are selected to make zero amount receipt as they are having positive and negative amounts.

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Probably an workaround would be to create a CREDIT NOTE on CANCEL …not sure about that …but could work …

I agree that’s a major refactoring on Frappe PK …i’d change it to autoincrement bigint PK … :grimacing:

For a situation where there must be no gaps whatsoever, internal controls should prevent a junior from creating an invoice that might/will not be completed.

I’m not disputing that there are places in the world where it is a legal requirement that there must be no gaps in invoice numbers. What I’m saying is that invoices should be treated as invoices i.e ‘non-disposable’ documents that confirm indebtedness of another party.

Hmm. I wasn’t aware of this. I am personally not enthusiastic about adding this change cos it’s going to be a really deep change and I feel like it’s duplication of effort. But someone on the team might.

Possibly so. SAP I have worked with didn’t have that behaviour (not Spanish module).

One question, in Spanish accounting, are Pro forma invoices or quotations made us of?

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That is an translation of the article 6 section a that i post before.

http://www.advoco.es/advice/10-business-support/80-invoicing-considerations-for-spanish-businesses.html

If for whatever reason an invoice is not paid (e.g. bad debt or it was issued in error), it must still be submitted in both your accounting and tax declarations but a claim can also be made for the bad debt or error, cancelling it out, either in the same or a future accounting period.

During the discussion, it was sounding like it’s illegal in Spain for a company to have a cancelled or void invoices in it’s books. From the last link I posted, it’s not illegal.

From your link …

  1. Invoice numbering and naming

An important Spanish rule to comply with concerns numbering of invoices. The business can choose whatever numbering convention they like but, once the first invoice has been issued, subsequent invoices must be numbered sequentially, upwards, without any gaps and in date order. So for example if you start with 0001001 you must follow this with 0001002, 0001003 etc You will find your accountant asks you to issue new invoices if there are gaps or if invoices are issued out of time e.g. today you issues 001003 and tomorrow 001002.

If for whatever reason an invoice is not paid (e.g. bad debt or it was issued in error), it must still be submitted in both your accounting and tax declarations but a claim can also be made for the bad debt or error, cancelling it out, either in the same or a future accounting period.

I do not know if people are confused or joking now … This is what i said in this thread from the start of discussion.

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Agree, creating reversal / similar to credit note would be better instead of deleting current ledger entries resulting in losing track in GL.

Yes, this would be the best method. There is a small difference here between the credit note and an rectificative (amended?) invoice. I think that a credit note can not complement an invoice that has already been presented (it can be quarterly, for example if you have a high volume of transactions, which is our case), must be a rectificative invoice. I consult the accountants and confirm it.

I agree, even rectification would work …always better than duplicate

I agree also on the automatic issuance of a credit note when an invoice is cancelled. It should solve a big part of this issue for Spain and maybe other countries.

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I would also do that a draft invoice do not have a invoice correlative number, or use another serie, until it is approved and pick up the next one of invoices.

It is like having products which are not yet yours and may never will be yours because the order is not carried out, with a bar code asigned. A product that has never gone through your warehouses and never are managed by you … another history is a dropshiping, i mean own products.

Nothing not aproved must be have a code thats affect to accounting of the bussiness.

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