QuickBooks offers many ways to bill your customers.
| If you bill like this... | And you receive payment like this... | Do this in QuickBooks... | Example businesses |
| You present a single document to your customer each time you make a sale or provide a service. | You receive payment at the time of the sale. | Fill in a sales receipt for each sale. | Artist, massage therapist |
| You receive payment later | Fill in an invoice for each sale. | Doctor, dentist, financial planner | |
| You bill your customers on a regular schedule. | You charge customers the same amount each time. | Create a recurring sales receipt template or a recurring invoice template for each customer. How? | Gym, internet service provider, membership organisation, landlord |
| You usually charge customers the same amount each time, but sometimes there are additional charges. |
Create a recurring invoice template for each customer (how?), and, in Company Settings > Advanced > Automation, set Automatically invoice unbilled activity to On. Then, enter charges, credits, billable expenses, or time charges when they occur (what are those?). |
Country club, lawn maintenance | |
| You charge customers different amounts each time. |
Enter charges, credits, time charges, or billable expenses (what are those?). Then create invoices automatically (in Company Settings > Advanced > Automation > Automatically invoice unbilled activity). |
Law firm, distributor, advertising firm | |
| You record charges for sales or services over time, and you want to present a invoice to your customers occasionally. | Enter charges, credits, time charges, or billable expenses (what are those?), and then create invoices when necessary. (How?). | Consultant, general contractor, web designer, programmer | |
| You don't want to record the details of each sale in QuickBooks. You just want to record a daily total. |
Create a recurring sales receipt with a line for each type of income you receive each day. How? |
Retailer, restaurant | |
| You want to remind customers to pay you. | Create statements for customers who have open balances. How? |