Deal with small underpayments

This article explains how to deal with receiving a small underpayment on an invoice from a customer in FreeAgent.

The example below is of a scenario where you invoiced a customer for £50 and they paid you £49.99, underpaying you £0.01.

1. Create a new spending category

Navigate to the Settings page and select ‘Accounting Categories’.

'Accounting Categories' highlighted in 'Accounting, Tax and VAT' area of Settings page.

Navigate to the ‘Add New’ drop-down menu and select ‘Admin Expenses category’.

'Admin Expenses category' highlighted on 'Add New' drop down menu.

Enter a name for the new category such as 'Penny roundings' in the ‘Description’ field. Select the relevant Reporting Name from the drop-down menu and ensure the new category is set as ‘Outside of the Scope of VAT’.

'Add new Admin Expenses category' pop up window with 'Outside of the scope of VAT' selected.

2. Add the underpayment to the invoice payment

Each time you receive a payment from a customer that falls a penny or two short of the amount you've invoiced, you’ll need to add the underpayment to the invoice payment.

Navigate to the relevant bank transaction and select ‘Fees and commissions’ from the ‘Adjustments’ drop-down menu.

Fees and commissions highlighted from the adjustments drop-down menu.

Enter the amount of the underpayment in the ‘Value’ field, £0.01 using our example.

Value set to '£0.01'.

Select ‘Other’ from the ‘Category’ options and choose the ‘Penny roundings’ category that you created from the drop-down menu.

Penny roundings category being selected

Select 'Save and finish' at the bottom of the screen.

3. Explain the invoice payment

Next, you’ll need to explain the invoice payment by selecting ‘Invoice Receipt’ from the ‘Type’ drop-down and choosing the relevant invoice from the ‘Invoice’ drop-down menu.

Invoice payment being explained

Select ‘Explain transaction’ to complete the process.

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