New Invoicing – invoice copied from locked period mess
Kelly, it is a long message. Please be patient. It demonstrates what mess is created in new invoicing. It demonstrates that new invoicing is not ready to fly solo after 20.11.2024. We must have a functional backup of classic invoicing if new invoicing is so erroneous.
I had to credit invoice INV-1548 for $1,483.35 in the locked period and replace it with two new invoices addressed to two customers (let’s call them customer1 and customer2). I had to show in the new invoices what was the credit part for each customer.
My steps are below:
1. I copied INV-1548 from the lock period to a new one – all is good
2. I recorded a negative line, -$1,000, in this new invoice – to show what service was taken off and approved & emailed to customer1 – all is good.
3. I opened the original invoice, INV-1548. in the locked period and created and applied a credit note to it to make the balance zero. All is good.
4. I clicked the email button and “send” and I got a message saying that it was impossible to email this invoice as it was in the locked period. But surprisingly it was emailed as I got a copy of it.
5. Then, I tried to copy INV-1548 (in the locked period that was credited to zero) to a new invoice again to address it to customer2. I could not do it; the error was “Unable to copy. Invoice has not saved successfully and cannot be copied. Try resolving error to allow to save”. See point 1 in the attached file.
6. I did not have any choice but to switch to classic invoicing and copy this invoice without any problem. I created INV-1989.
7. Then I added a negative line, -$483.35, so the balance was $1,000 and emailed it to customer_2. All was good.
The above was yesterday.
Today I received a tax invoice from customer_2, INV-0011. I recorded it as a bill in our books. Now I need to offset this bill with our INV-1989. The offset value is $1,000.
I applied payments of $1,000 from the suspense account to the bill and invoice. It should have posted two entries in the suspense account DR and CR of $1,000. So, they negate each other.
To my surprise I discovered this in the suspense account: see point 2 in the attached file.
What wires got crossed in Xero’s brain?! Why instead of $1,000 CR Xero recorded $1,483.35 DR and $483.35 CR???
Okay, I thought that I needed to try to record some test invoices to check what is going on. See point 3 in the attached file.
INV-1991 was recorded in classic invoicing and it had a negative line, INV-1993 was recorded in new invoicing and it had a negative line as well. But the payments applied to them from the suspense account were correct, i.e. $5.50 DR and $110.00 DR.
My guess is that the problem stems from the invoice in the locked period that was not saved correctly after it was credited.
The two entries of $1,483.35 DR and $483.35 CR instead of $1,000 Cr are NOT ACCEPTABLE. It is a weird glitch that will stay in our books now.
Please DO NOT SWTICH OFF classic invoicing.
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Dawn Middleton commented
I agree please do not switch off classic invoicing the new invoicing is painful when trying to do invoicing on the phone in fact it is just painful.
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Jim Morris commented
Ah, I see. My apologies, I misread your explanation.
In any case, I still agree, this is yet another example of why New invoicing is not ready for prime time release as it is simply not capable of replicating the system it replaces.
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Olga O'Keefe commented
Hi Jim,
Xero did not lock anything in our books. I lock every month when finish the EOM procedure.
Sorry, my explanation was very long and complex. The locking was not a problem.
The problem was and is that when we lock the period, we must be allowed to do certain actions with the records in the locked period (email, copy, credit). Classis invoicing allows us to do so, but new invoicing prohibits it. There are many posts about it in the product idea space.
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Jim Morris commented
Yep, I know that Olga.
My point was who gave Xero the right to dictate to us the how and when things get locked?
It is us, the business owner, that should be making the decision to lock the period when we are ready for it to be locked...and, by extension, if we need to unlock something to make a correction then that also needs to be our decision, not Xero's.
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Olga O'Keefe commented
Jim,
The ability to lock a period is a standard option in any accounting software. It is useful and needed. But there are some functions that we must be able to do with the bills and invoices recorded in the locked period: copy, email, apply a credit. These functions do not alter any records in the locked period.
In the beginning of this year new invoicing did not allow to do anything from above with an invoice in the locked period. Now, we can do some but it is erroneous.
This problem goes away if we open the locked period. But it is not a solution. There is the only solution to this problem - Xero MUST fix their errors!
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Olga O'Keefe commented
Jeff Fowler,
thank you for your comment.
While I was posting my idea I found this:
https://productideas.xero.com/forums/939198-for-small-
businesses/suggestions/44960803-lock-dates-allocate-credit-notes-to-invoices-bilThey do not plan to do it. But read Kelly's reply and users' comments. It is very sad.
Xero must have consultants who are not just bookkeepers and accounts but active Xero users as well.
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Jim Morris commented
Why are invoices being locked, by Xero, in the first place? Who gave them the right to dictate to us how and when invoices in our businesses get locked out?
Who the AF do they think they are?
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Jeff Fowler commented
The locked period restrictions are so ridiculous Olga, I'm sorry that you are having what appear to be obvious and embarrassing bugs. The inability to email locked invoices is such a stupid regression, I have no idea why they thought that was a good idea. I think they need a few users on their development team who actually work in a small business with multiple Xero users.