TamilAccounting

Direct Invoice

A Direct Invoice is the bill you give a customer after selling goods or services. It shows what was sold, the quantity, price, taxes, total payable and the payment terms, and it is the document that records the sale in your accounts. It is also called a Tax Invoice or Sales Invoice.

Where to find it

Go to Sales > Invoices > New Direct Invoice. Use it when the sale, the dispatch and the billing all happen together and raising a separate order and delivery first would be needless paperwork.

A direct invoice creates the sales order and delivery behind the scenes, so the transaction chain stays consistent. That is what keeps stock movement, audit trail and reporting accurate even though you only filled in one form.

Before you start

The customer must exist and have at least one branch.
The items must exist, and stock items must be available at the delivery location.
The accounting period must be open for the invoice date.
You need the SA_SALESINVOICE permission.

Header field reference

Field	Required	Description
Customer	Yes	Who is buying. The list shows your most recent and most transacted customers first, up to ten at a time, and you can search to narrow it. Use the `+` button to create a customer without leaving the form.
Customer Branch	Yes	The specific location, office or division of that customer. One customer can have many branches, and the branch drives the billing address and tax group.
Transaction Reference	Yes	The unique identifier for this document type. The format comes from your pattern in Setup > Transaction Reference, and the value can be overtyped without changing the pattern.
Sales Area	No	The geographical area or market segment. Used for sales analysis reporting.
Payment Terms	No	How and when payment is due, such as Cash Only or Pay After 10 Days. This sets the due date. Use the `+` icon to create a term with a custom due-date limit.
Price List / Sales Type	No	Which of your Sales Lists applies, such as Retail for end customers or Wholesale for B2B. It also decides whether line prices are entered inclusive or exclusive of tax.
Deliver From Location	Yes	The warehouse the goods are issued from. Stock is reduced here, and it determines the quantity on hand shown on each line.
Sales Person	No	The staff member responsible for the sale, so commission and analysis are attributed correctly.

Dates

Date	What it controls
Date	The invoice date. Revenue, tax and stock movement all post on this date, so it must fall in an open accounting period. Item pricing resolves against it too.
Due Date	When payment falls due, calculated from the payment terms and editable.

The second date field is shared across the sales documents and relabelled for each: Due Date on an invoice, Required Delivery Date on an order, Valid until on a quotation, Invoice before on a delivery.

Customer's Current Credit and Balance

Customer Current Credit — the credit still available, based on their limit less what they already owe.
Customer Current Balance — the total currently owed across all open transactions.

A customer whose Credit Status disallows invoicing will be blocked here, before the sale is entered. That is deliberate — it forces the overdue balance to be dealt with rather than grown.

Branches & Departments

Branches represent separate business locations or units of the same company, giving transactions by location, inventory per branch, and branch-wise accounting. Enable under Setup > Preferences > Use Branches Only.
Departments are internal divisions responsible for a specific function, letting you attribute revenue to the part of the business that earned it.

Line Items

Column	Description
Item Description	The item being sold. Type to search by code or description.
QOH	Quantity on hand at the selected location as at the invoice date. This figure matters — you are about to reduce it.
Quantity	How many units are being sold.
Unit	The unit of measure, from the item record.
Price Before Tax or Price After Tax	The unit price. The heading follows the selected sales type: Price After Tax when it is tax inclusive, Price Before Tax when it is not. With tax switched off entirely it reads Price.
Discount	Line discount percentage, defaulting to the customer's discount.
Total	The line value after discount.

Read the price column heading before typing. Entering a tax inclusive figure into a Price Before Tax column is the most common cause of an invoice total that does not match what the customer was quoted.

Barcode Scanning

Enable it under Setup > Preferences > Use Barcode Functionality.
A barcode field then appears on the invoice form.
Scan the product barcode and the item is added automatically.

Insufficient Quantity Warning

The system prevents negative stock by default, to keep stock movement and accounting accurate. If the quantity entered would drive stock below zero, the entry is blocked with:

Marked items have insufficient quantities in stock as on day of delivery.

The usual causes are the Inventory Location — the stock may sit in a different warehouse — or a transaction date earlier than the date the stock arrived. Check both before assuming the stock is missing.

Allowing Negative Inventory

Where your workflow requires it, enable negative stock under Setup > Preferences > Allow Negative Inventory. Invoices will then process even when stock is insufficient, at the cost of unreliable stock valuation until the balance is corrected.

Quantity Management

You can add the same item several times on one invoice at different prices. If you would rather a repeated item update the existing line, enable Setup > Preferences > Update Existing Line Item in Sales.

Total Details

Field	Description
Sub-total	The sum of all line totals before additional charges or discounts.
Shipping Charges	Any delivery cost being charged.
Discount %	A discount applied to the invoice total as a whole, on top of line discounts.
Tax Details	The total tax, broken down by rate showing percentage and amount, for example `GST 5% - 2.00`.
Round Off / Discount	A fixed adjustment for rounding or a small negotiated reduction.
Update	Recalculates the totals after any change above.

Delivery Details

Field	Description
Delivery Address	Where the goods are going. Defaults to the customer branch address, overtypeable for a one-off. Maximum 255 characters.
Shipping Company	The carrier handling the delivery.

Comments

Free notes about the sale, stored with the invoice and available on the printed document.

Custom Fields

Custom fields let you add your own inputs where the standard form does not capture something you need. Create text boxes, dropdowns, radio buttons, check boxes, date pickers and amount boxes, in the header, line items or footer.

Enable under Setup > Preferences > Show Add Custom Field on Forms.
An Add Fields option then appears in the header and footer, and Add Field at the top centre of the line items.
Remove them any time from Setup > Custom Fields.

Attachments

Attach supporting documents — a signed purchase order, a delivery receipt, a contract. Click the attachment or browse option, select the files, and they are stored against the invoice.

Draft Option

Click Draft while creating the invoice.
It is saved without affecting stock and without creating financial entries.
Find it in the invoice list with a Draft status.
Open it and finalise when ready.

General Ledger (GL)

Account	Effect
Accounts Receivable	Debited — records what the customer owes.
Sales Account	Credited — records the revenue earned.
Tax Accounts	Credited — records tax collected on behalf of the government.
C.O.G.S. Account	Debited — the cost of the goods sold.
Inventory Account	Credited — reduces stock value as goods leave.

Service items produce no cost of sales or inventory entries, because nothing physical moves. Only the revenue, tax and receivable are posted.

Editing a Sales Invoice

An invoice can be edited subject to permissions and to your country's tax rules. In several jurisdictions a finalised tax invoice may not be altered or deleted at all, only credited. If Edit is unavailable, that is the tax rules being enforced rather than a permission problem — raise a credit note instead.

Related Transactions & Actions

Action	What it does
Payment	Record what the customer pays against the invoice.
Credit This	Reverse all or part of the invoice with a credit note.
Print / Email	Issue the invoice to the customer.
Share Link	Send a link to the invoice by email or WhatsApp.
Repeat	Duplicate the invoice, useful for recurring billing.
Void	Cancel the invoice, reversing its financial effect.

Importing Sales Invoices

To migrate invoices in bulk from other software, use the Excel import rather than keying them individually. See Import Sales transaction, which creates the invoices, orders and deliveries together.

Invoices Report

For a consolidated view, go to Reports > Sales to filter invoices over a date range and export as PDF or Excel. PDF templates can be created or modified from the Reports area. The Invoices list covers the same ground interactively.

Add On

This screen changes with the add-ons you have installed. With the Approval add-on enabled, for example, an extra tab appears on the invoice view carrying the approval detail for the Super Admin. Other add-ons may add their own fields or tabs to the form.

Invoices — find and action invoices
Sales Invoice View — read one invoice in detail
Direct Delivery — ship now and bill later
Batch Invoice for Delivery Notes — bill several deliveries at once
Invoice to Credit Note — reverse an invoice
Customer Payment — collect what is owed
Customer Credit Status — how credit blocks work

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