[Invoicing Module] Feedback

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avatar Ilija Studen Staff Jul 27. 2009. 12:46 pm #21
Hi Olaf,

Thanks for the followup - we are glad to hear that it's working for you now. Here are the answers to your questions:

1. It's by design. Imagine how would invoice look like for large projects where there are hundreds of time records. Instead, activeCollab sums up the time from the time report and creates a single item. If you don't like that, you can always remove item that's created by default and put any number of items that you want.

2. Thanks for the feedback, we'll check that one out.
avatar okreitz Pro Jul 27. 2009. 12:54 pm #22
Thanks for the prompt reply.

#1: makes total sense!
#2: thanks for checking

Olaf
avatar ira42 Pro Jul 28. 2009. 9:02 am #23
Hi guys,

Love the idea of the Invoice Module. Good job!

However, unless I'm missing something, it can not really be used in Canada, or anywhere that uses compound taxes.

At least here in Quebec, we have 2 sets of taxes (GST & PST), which are 5% and 7.5%. Problem is that the GST is first applied to the subtotal, and then the PST is applied to the subtotal * GST. So for a $1000 invoice:

SUBTOTAL: $1000
GST: (1000 * .05) = $50
PST: (1050 * .075) = $78.75
TOTAL: $1128.75

Are there perhaps any hooks that I could use to extend the module? Or would I have to modify the core module code directly?

Tx!

Ira
avatar Ilija Studen Staff Jul 28. 2009. 10:07 am #24
Hi Ira,

You are correct - system currently is not able to calculate compound taxes. We'll see to have this implemented in one of the future releases. I'm afraid that the only option at the moment is to hack the code :(
avatar lockwesmonster Pro Jul 29. 2009. 8:06 pm #25
In the invoices archive for the total paid column, there is a static value of $1230.

It can be found in /activecollabs/applications/modules/invoicing/views/invoicing_archive/index.tpl at line 17.

What variable should be here?

BTW, I just updated to the newest version of the beta today.
avatar Ilija Studen Staff Jul 30. 2009. 3:51 am #26
Hi lockwesmonster,

We still need to rethink Invoices Archive a bit before the final version. Current version is not functional.
avatar lockwesmonster Pro Jul 30. 2009. 7:47 am #27
Thanks Ilija.

I have a suggestion.

I think it would be great to be able to define different bill rates per hour, similar to the way you can define a rate per hour per currency.

Here is the way I am currently using the currency feature. First, I went through every template view (and javascript), commented out {$active_invoice->getCurrencyCode()|clean} and then added $ in front of the total amount. This way the abbreviation of my currencies would not show up at all.

I then went into the currency section and made some custom currencies. For example, my hourly bill rate for development is different from my hourly bill rate for my creative. Thus, I set up "Development" as a currency with its hourly bill rate and set up Creative with its own hourly bill rate.

However, there are a couple of caveats about doing this.
1) It only works if you are only planning on receiving one type of currency. In my case the $ (USD).
2) If there are multiple rows in the invoice that contain different types of "currencies" (in my case if it contains a "Creative" row and a "Development" row), both rows will inherit the same bill rate as defined in the currency drop down. Thus, you will have to manually override the hourly rate of the row that is not the same type as defined in the drop down yourself.

My Conclusion and Suggestion:
It would be best if you could define a category in the time tracking module and then assign hourly bill rates for each category in the invoicing module.
avatar mrakar Pro Aug 4. 2009. 8:00 am #28
hello,

I think adding invoincing option is a great thing, I have installed beta (after some troubles) and have created my first invoice.

Here are some thoughts on my invoice:

a) invoice number: different companies have different invoicing schemes, for example in my company invoice number will always start with 1000. I have issued a number of invoices this year and I wish to move to AC invoicing module but how can I start issuing invoices with number 1233? some companies have different number series for different services (for example invoices starting with 1 or even letter might be for items sold, and series 2 or another letter might be for services)

b) in EU and basically all other countries companies and people have their VAT/TAX number. This is quite important and basically this is single most important unique number for particular subject. Maybe it deserves its own field in the database?

c) invoice items: you have option to add tax to each line of the invoice. I do not think that is smart thing to do. VAT is usually calculated in a way that you have to add all invoice items and only then you add VAT percentage. In this scenario you might actually create invoice which will not be valid, because sum of invoice items and their tax will not be the same as if you sum all invoice items and then add VAT on the sum. (rounding will create difference which will not be alowed by your tax office)

d) there is not a place where you can add discount or malus for particular line item. For example, you might wish (or your customer might insist on it) to have their contractual discunt shown on the invoice. Also there might be a case where you want to add some percentage for special work (for example your normal work hour is 50eur and night or weekend hours are 50% more).

d1) invoice might deserve special discount on total sum (either in percentage or in monetary equivalent)

e) software will allow you to add quite long sentences, but it will not alow you to add some description (for example "domain migration" as main invoice line item and then below with few lines of additional explanations such as:
- DNS reconfiguration
- backup of the old domain
- restoration
- upgrade....)

This are quick ones, I will try to analyse and suggest some more ideas.
avatar Ilija Studen Staff Aug 4. 2009. 12:58 pm #29
Hi Marko,

Thank you for the feedback - we really appreciate it.

Just a quick note about discounts: if you wish to include information about discount you gave to the client or list services that you did pro bono, you can add items with negative or 0 amount. It does not support values to be set in percents, but it can get the job done.
avatar Leon Pro Aug 5. 2009. 12:31 am #30
Some really great points above!

We were thinking today that if an extra column or two like 'amount paid' or 'amount due/remaining' was added to the table on the Invoices Issued (/invoices) page it would make that at-a-glance information a lot more informative.

Can't wait for next release of Invoices module :)
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