Hayes re: I need a report
Terri Hayes
asl4me at gmail.com
Tue Mar 15 12:26:46 EDT 2016
Derek,
>>Why? This is a serious question. If you bill different departments in the
same company, are they being PAID by different departments?
Yes they are very often being paid by different departments -and or by
different people in the same department but through different
local/cash/accounting funding streams. (And very often these people do not
seem to talk to each other)....
>> Don't most companies have a single Payables department?
I dont know how these businesses manage their accounts. Certainly some of
the places i work for are... more predictable... in how they make their
payments -but payments to me do not often seem to follow a "standard"
procedure (and i am not the one who is going to tell them that their
business practices are clunky)... I just keep track of whats still due (by
invoice #) and keep reminding them until i get paid.
I'm an Interpreter for the Deaf. Most places that hire us -will hire us
directly. Sometimes we are paid for with petty cash -sometimes we are paid
for from some "other" cash account (with either cash or a check)
-Sometimes, we are paid for through a formal accounts payable process. But
often there is no standing contract -there is no purchase officer/ no
contract officer - very often no contract at all...and no -the invoices are
not all paid in order... Sometimes they "lose one.., or two..." Sometimes i
get paid and the check is annotated for a specific invoice # and the next
week i'll receive another check worth two invoice amounts -again annotated
for that same invoice # and then i'll receive a payment for one invoice
amount the following week and no invoice number will be annotated at all...
(I haveoine company who has paid me -on time - for maybe 20 or 30 separate
invoices-all of which have been noted as payment for the very first invoice
number... Makes it hard to tell them which invoice has not been paid -when
they do get behind.. But that is invariable their question when i say they
missed one. They want to know which one -and when it was sent and who got
it and who approved it...... (And if you call and ask which invoice was
paid with any given check, very often -the person has No Idea)... In fact -
very often the person i talk to has nothing to do with the money that will
be paid to me... They just approve the payment.. And the person signing the
check has no idea what the payment was for - nor am i ever told who that is
or how to contact them. Because the person who has approved payment and the
person who is writing the check and the person who actually received the
services are all different people and very often are all in different
places. So I (and many if not all interpreters who work freelance directly)
are constantly checking and cross checking by invoice -date of job -date
due /date recieved and invoice amount...
>> Certainly every company that I've worked for/in (at least those under
1,000 employees)
have a single department that pays bills for the company.
No idea. No idea how many employees any of the companies I provide services
to has. No idea if the payments to me ever gets logged by an accounting
department. You'd think it should -but i dont have any relationship with
that part of their business. So i have no idea.
>>But back to the question at hand. Say you have multiple invoices to the
same company - do they not pay the invoices in order?
Nope. Sometimes -if youre lucky -but not usually... Depends on if the two
(+) invoices were for the same client and whether payment was being
arranged by the same person... I might go to two jobs at the same place on
the same day for the same person but the invoices will be paid for by
different people. So i might get payment for one of those invoices in 3
days snd the other i might have to chase down and not get payment for 2
months...
>>Or if they do miss an invoice, do you specifically need to *point them*
to the missing invoice?
Yes -if they miss an invoice -it becomes a missing invoice and i have to
resubmit the same invoice again (which includes all of the original job
information -location address contact person (same invoice -same number)...
To the same approver and start the process over -so they can verify that
the job actually happened and that it has not already been paid... And so
they dont get confused ...and either pay me twice (has happened -and its
almost impossible to give them back the overpayment)... Or they'll pay me
for the *next* invoice and continue to not recognize the one thats been
missed.
Something of a nightmare... Except we have invoice numbers -and can keep
each invoiced job clearly defined from all the other invoiced jobs.
I'm not sure what other peoples "business" looks like but for the last 37
years -this is what my (and every other freelance interpreter's) invoice
/business process looks like.
Thanks for listening
On Tue, Mar 15, 2016 at 10:57 AM Derek Atkins <warlord at mit.edu> wrote:
> Hi Terri,
>
> Terri Hayes <asl4me at gmail.com> writes:
>
> > Derek, I think i understand your question and why your paradigm is
> > different from mine -and will try to explain:
> > What i believe i understand you to mean -is that you invoice for a
> product
> > as delivered. You get an order for a product -you deliver that number of
> > product and submit one or more invoices and you expect payment in full
> for
> > all invoices. To you -whats important is the total due -regardless if how
> > many invoices have been submitted or how many products have been
> delivered.
>
> Nope, that's not what I mean. I ran a consulting business, so my
> product was me. My invoices were for my work-product (e.g., my time).
>
> > Your relationship with your recievables is about final totals -not
> > individual invoices.
>
> This is certainly true; it was unimportant how many invoices I sent. I
> only cared about whether or not I was paid. And if I wasn't paid then I
> could go print a Customer Report to let them know how much was left to
> pay.
>
> > My (and any service business) has a different relationship with our
> > invoices.
>
> I disagree with the statement "and any service business".
>
> > I work *by* invoice. So on any given day i might have one to five
> > invoices going to one to five different companies. These companies will
> pay
> > me -By invoice (almost Never by total due from company) because i will
> have
> > provided services to one or more Departments in the company -and each of
> > them will pay me using different resources and at different times. So
> while
> > seeing how much a single company owes me is handy for an "in the next 30
> > days my income should be about "this much""... Perspective... What i need
> > to keep a close eye on is which individual invoices have not been paid
> and
> > when do I expect them ...
>
> Why? This is a serious question. If you bill different departments in
> the same company, are they being PAID by different departments? Don't
> most companies have a single Payables department? Certainly every
> company that I've worked for/in (at least those under 1,000 employees)
> have a single department that pays bills for the company. I admit that
> I can't answer for the three major-sized companies I've worked for.
>
> But back to the question at hand. Say you have multiple invoices to the
> same company (multiple invoices to multiple companies doesn't matter
> because per-invoice or per-company is the same when it's a 1:1 mapping),
> do they not pay the invoices in order? Or if they do miss an invoice,
> do you specifically need to *point them* to the missing invoice? Or is
> it purely a question for your own mind/use?
>
> > Because I send out my invoices each saturday and expect payment for that
> > week's invoices to arrive any time from one week to 30 days later.
> Having a
> > list showing the invoices outstanding and the day they're "due"
> (expected)
> > lets me know if i can expect money this week (and about how much) or if
> > there is not really anything coming in for another two or three weeks (or
> > when)...
>
> Okay, now THIS is certainly an interesting idea.
>
> One could take the "Bills Due Reminder" and modify it to show Invoices.
>
> One could also take the Aging report and modify it a bit to show a list
> instead of grouping.
>
> > All of this happens long before the 30 days late time period -and
> > none of it can be easily seen on the customer report which basically
> shows
> > a list of every invoice and every payment and somewhere in that list are
> > invoices which have not yet been paid... But i dont see any way to
> subtotal
> > it or ignore paid invoices and payments received...So its really not an
> > easy glance to find what my current income might be at any given moment.
>
> True. What you're asking for is a new report. The pieces are all
> there, but it's not put together the way you're asking.
>
> > Thank you for asking!
>
> You're welcome.
>
> > Terri Hayes
>
> -derek
>
> > On Mon, Mar 14, 2016 at 12:40 PM Derek Atkins <warlord at mit.edu> wrote:
> >
> >> Hi,
> >>
> >> Terri Hayes <asl4me at gmail.com> writes:
> >>
> >> > ps - I am not a programmer - and I *am* a business owner - so I dont
> >> > really have the time to learn to program...
> >> > this kind of very basic functionality should not be this difficult -
> >> > I'm still reeling that the person who crated the invoice process in
> >> > GNUCash didn't include this as a basic report..
> >> > I dont get it - what kind of business doesn't need to know a list of
> >> > what's outstanding?
> >>
> >> A business that cares about how much a Customer owes and doesn't
> >> specifically care about "which invoice" was paid or not. Which, as a
> >> business owner and the author of the GnuCash Business Tools, is exactly
> >> why it's written that way. In the original version of the tools, you
> >> NEVER "paid" an invoice; only the customer. The fact that invoices get
> >> "marked paid" was a side effect. Only more recently can you actually
> >> specify which invoices get marked.
> >>
> >> Still, the Customer Report exists to show how much a customer owes. And
> >> it will tell you which payments applied to which invoices, and give a
> >> running total. Have you looked at that report? Why, specifically, is
> >> that not sufficient for your (or your customer's) needs?
> >>
> >> > Thanks again for any help you can give me.
> >> > Terri Hayes
> >>
> >> > Please remember to CC this list on all your replies.
> >> > You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.
> >>
> >> -derek
> >>
> >> --
> >> Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
> >> Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board (SIPB)
> >> URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/ PP-ASEL-IA N1NWH
> >> warlord at MIT.EDU PGP key available
> >>
> > _______________________________________________
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> > -----
> > Please remember to CC this list on all your replies.
> > You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.
> >
> >
>
> --
> Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
> Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board (SIPB)
> URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/ PP-ASEL-IA N1NWH
> warlord at MIT.EDU PGP key available
>
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