Activate Your Billing System (Invoicing 101)
Table of Contents
This guide provides the foundation for billing configuration, detailing how to customize invoice settings, set default payment terms and tax rates, configure open invoice reminders, create contracts, manage non-billable labor time, and integrate payment processors or accounting platforms.
Notes:
- Throughout the documentation, you'll sometimes see text in italic font. This means the term is defined in our Syncro Glossary.
- For a high-level overview of where things are in Syncro, see About the Syncro Header & Primary Navigation Bar.
Step 1: Customize Invoice Settings
If you will be sending your clients Invoices from Syncro, it's a good idea to customize how they will appear.
Snippet: Invoice Settings
Watch this short video to learn more:
Review the Invoice Settings Reference and customize them now.
Step 2: Set Default Payment Terms
Payment Terms allow you to automate late fees for overdue Invoices. This can encourage your clients to pay on time and helps you keep track of any overdue invoices.
Syncro's Payment Terms are flexible and you can customize them as desired. For example, you can have Syncro:
- Set due dates for invoices.
- Add late fees as line items when clients miss a payment due date.
- Create maximum and minimum amounts for late fees.
- Automate late fees to trigger each month an invoice remains unpaid.
- Send you an alert whenever a late fee is added to an invoice (via the Notification Center).
Use the step-by-step instructions in Manage Payment Terms to set your default terms for your invoices.
Step 3: Configure Open Invoice Reminders
The Open Invoice Reminders feature in Syncro allows you to send automated reminders for open invoices based on the age of the invoice.
Watch this short video to learn more:
Use the step-by-step instructions in Open Invoice Reminders and create one now.
Step 4: Configure a Default Tax Rate
You can have multiple tax rates in Syncro. The tax rate that appears first in the list of tax rates becomes the default tax rate. This means that while you can change it for specific Organizations and/or Products when you need to, you never have to.
Use the step-by-step instructions in Configure Tax Rates to set your default tax rate now.
Step 5: Configure Syncro Payments
To take payments, you must configure a payment processor.
With Syncro Payments, you can accept credit card and ACH payments directly in Syncro, without third-party portals or separate billing platforms. Set processing fee rules, manage recurring invoices, and handle payment support all in one place.
Watch this short video to learn more:
Go set up Syncro Payments now.
Step 6: Integrate Accounting & Pax8 Billing Automation
In addition to setting up Syncro Payments, you can optionally integrate an accounting platform like QuickBooks Online or Xero.
Integrating your accounting platform with Syncro streamlines your financial processes by automatically syncing invoices, expenses, and payments. This saves time, reduces errors, and provides real-time financial visibility. These in turn simplify bookkeeping, enhance financial reporting, and ease tax preparation.
Check out Integrating QuickBooks or Set Up Xero Online. (You may want to dedicate a little extra time to this step.)
With the Pax8 integration, you can automate the billing of products you resell using Pax8, right through Syncro.
If you want to do this, learn more about how to get started with Pax8.
Step 7: Map Payment Methods
A Payment Method consists of a descriptive Name you'll recognize later, and a Payment Type. The Payment Type is what ultimately defines the behavior of the payment method.
Once you have a credit card processing gateway like Syncro Payments enabled, any Payment Methods of type “Credit Card” in Syncro will use that gateway.
However, it's a good idea to map any other Payment Methods to the Payment Types you plan to accept.
Step 8: Create a Contract
Snippet: Create a Contract
A Contract is an agreement you have with your clients.
Contracts can be as simple as defining a start/end date for an antivirus subscription, or as complex as a managed service contract with defined product discounts and Service Level Agreements (SLAs).
In Syncro, all your client contracts are stored together in the Contract Manager.
Watch this short video to learn more:
If you want, you can assign a Service Level Agreement (SLA) to an individual Ticket or to a Contract. If assigned, all tickets created under that contract will default to having that agreement.
Use the step-by-step in Create a Contract to create a contract now. (Bonus: Define which labor products will default to a non-billable state.)
Step 9: Set Up Non-Billable Labor Time
Syncro's advanced time tracking features help you and your Technicians track time that is billable to your customers, as well as time that is not. For billable Ticket time, you can then add charges for the work you've done to an Invoice so you can get paid for that work.
Watch this short video to learn more:
As part of the set up process, you can set a minimum time entry and incremental value per Labor Type, and thereby specify your own labor time requirements.
Your selected minimums and increments are then used in the Ticket Timer/Labor Log to automatically round the billable time so Techs don’t have to remember the timing for each Labor Type.
Follow the steps described in About Syncro's Non-Billable Labor Feature to set this up the way you want.
Next Steps
If you've completed these steps, you have a great start to your Invoicing setup in Syncro!
- Proceed to the Products & Services Training Guide, which has some steps you'll need to complete before Invoicing Training Guide (102).
- Then to move onto creating invoices and accepting payments, you check out the Invoicing Training Guide (102).
- Or, explore the other available Training Guides.