Credit can be added to a client’s account balance in a number of ways:
- When a payment has been made in excess of the amount owing, e.g. the client owes $100 but you record a payment of $150 a $50 credit is created
- When a payment has been recorded on a client account with no outstanding invoices, essentially $0 balance owing
- When an Invoice that a payment has been logged against is deleted before the Receipt with the associated payment is deleted
Credits can be applied as payment on outstanding invoices and then unapplied later if needed. The transactions that generated the credit on file for the client can be refunded if needed as well.
To refund a credit generating transaction, open the client’s profile and go to Finances > Receipts. Look through the receipts to find the one that created the credit. Click the checkbox to select it and then click the View button:
You will see the blue Refund button in the sidebar:
Clicking the Refund button will open the Refund Payment window:
Enter the amount of credit you wish to refund to the client in the field provided and then click the Refund Payment button to confirm. An alert will appear to let you know that once a refund has been processed you will not be able to delete any of the related financial documents.
Note - You cannot process a refund that exceeds the amount of the original payment, and you cannot process a refund for a negative amount. When you process a refund for a transaction that generated credit on a client’s file, the balance of credit on file for the client will be reduced accordingly but balance owing will not be added to the client’s account.
This is important to remember in the case where credit is added to a client’s file if an invoice with an associated receipt for payment has been deleted BEFORE the receipt. If you delete an invoice that has an associated receipt, credit for the amount of the invoice will be added to the client’s account. If you then refund the receipt for the original payment that no longer has an associated invoice, the client’s record will not show that balance is still owing for the session with the deleted invoice because it has been logged as credit on the client’s account.
If you need to make billing corrections, always look to the Receipts first and then the Invoices.