Work order billing and deposits

1:45

The Work Order Page (1:45 video). Open on its own page

Require a deposit before work begins

Work orders can require a deposit — a flat amount or a percentage — before work begins. Default deposit due dates are part of the payment terms on the Invoice Configuration page, alongside invoice due dates.

• Tick Require Deposit on the work order form, then pick a Deposit Type: Flat Amount or Percentage. Quotes (work order quotes) have the same Deposit Type choice, and a work order has a Flat amount / Percentage choice under "Require a deposit before scheduling".
• How a percentage deposit is calculated: it is that percent of the work order's total after discounts, including tax, rounded to the cent. For example, $1,000 of line items taxed at 8% with a 10% discount is $900 plus $72.00 tax, $972.00, so a 50% deposit is $486.00. The form shows the math under the field, for example "50% of the total after discounts, including tax ($972.00) = $486.00". With no taxable lines it reads "50% of the total after discounts ($900.00) = $450.00".
• Once the deposit invoice is sent, its amount is locked. Changing the line items or discounts afterwards does not change a deposit that was already invoiced. The work order's Deposit card, the customer portal, QuickBooks and the final invoice's deposit credit all use the amount on the deposit invoice.
• Discounts are never shrunk by a deposit. A percentage discount always comes off the full subtotal, and the paid deposit is credited on the final invoice as its own line. The deposit invoice plus the final invoice always add up to the work order's total including tax.
• The deposit invoice has no tax row of its own. A percentage deposit already includes its share of the tax, but the deposit is a prepayment toward the job: all of the sales tax is charged on the final invoice, which then credits the deposit.
• Prepaid in full? Nothing more to bill. When the paid deposit covers the whole work order (for example a 100% deposit), Pool Founder creates the final invoice for you as soon as the work order is completed: $0.00 due, already marked paid, and never emailed or texted to the customer. It records the sales tax and credits the deposit, so the work order shows as billed and paid (the Invoice card reads Covered by deposit) and never waits under Ready to bill. You do not need to click Create Invoice. If the deposit is paid after the work order was completed, the $0 final invoice is created when the payment comes in. If the deposit covers only part of the total, the work order goes to Ready to bill as usual for the rest.
• Creating a work order that requires a deposit sends the deposit invoice automatically. While it is being created, the Deposit card on the work order's Billing tab reads "Creating deposit invoice...".
• When no deposit invoice has gone out yet (for example, work orders bulk-created on To Schedule with "Send deposit invoices now" off, or when the automatic invoice could not be created), the Deposit card reads Deposit not invoiced yet. Click Send deposit invoice to create it and email it to the customer. Sending it takes permission to create invoices.
• A work order made from a quote with a deposit shares the quote's deposit invoice. If the quote already sent one, Send deposit invoice links that invoice instead of making a new one; if the work order sends it first, the quote links to it. Either way the customer gets one deposit invoice, and paying it marks both paid.

Waiting on deposit: prepay work

A work order that requires a deposit shows Waiting on deposit while its deposit invoice has been sent and the customer has not paid it, and nothing is booked yet. It is worked out from the deposit, so there is nothing to set: it means nothing is needed from you until the customer pays.

• Where it shows: a teal Waiting on deposit pill next to the work order's name on its page, the page's status tile ("Waiting on deposit · Ready to schedule once paid") and its Schedule step, the banner "Waiting on the customer's deposit", and the work order's status badge in the Jobs list (instead of Not Started).
• On Work orders to schedule these work orders sit in their own collapsed Waiting on deposit section above the list, with the amount owed, when the deposit invoice was sent and how many reminder texts went out. They are left out of the to-schedule counts and the "due and not scheduled" to-do and alerts. Accepted quotes set to create their work order Automatically once the deposit is paid are listed there too, marked "Accepted quote, work order made once paid".
• When the deposit is paid (online, or recorded by hand) the work order becomes an ordinary Not scheduled work order, ready to schedule, and moves into the to-schedule list on its own. A quote set to create its work order once the deposit is paid creates it then.
• You can still schedule it anyway. The status is information only and nothing blocks booking: open the work order (its row in the Waiting on deposit section links to it) and schedule it as usual, or drag it onto a route day. From then on it shows Scheduled, and the Deposit card still says the deposit is unpaid.
• If the deposit invoice is voided, the work order is no longer waiting on the customer: its Deposit card goes back to Deposit not invoiced yet so you can send a new one.
• A deposit that has not been sent yet is not "waiting on deposit": the Deposit card says Deposit not invoiced yet and the to-do list reminds you to send it.

Deposit reminder texts

Pool Founder can text the customer a reminder to pay their deposit. Turn on the Deposit reminder row on Messages → Phone → Automated texts (managers only). It is off by default for every company. Expand the row to choose the schedule:

• How often: Every day, Every 2 days, Every 3 days (the default), or Once a week. Never more often than once a day.
• Reminders per deposit: 1 to 5 (default 3). After that many for one deposit invoice, no more go out. There is no way to set more than 5.
• The first reminder goes out one interval after the deposit invoice was sent (never the same day), at 10:00 AM your company's time, inside your sending hours. Each next one comes one interval after the last.
• They stop on their own as soon as the deposit is paid, the deposit invoice is voided, the work order is archived or completed, or the quote is declined or archived.
• Default wording: "{companyName}: reminder, your {amount} deposit is due. Pay here: {payLink}" ({amount} is what is still owed; {payLink} is the deposit invoice's pay page, the same link its email opens). You can reword it on the row, with <code>{firstName}</code>, <code>{companyName}</code>, <code>{amount}</code> and <code>{payLink}</code>. It goes to the customer who pays the bill.
• Same rules as every automated text: SMS consent, STOP, the customer's own Texts preference (it has a Deposit reminder switch), the daily per-customer limit, and texting live on your own business number (no shared-number fallback). A reminder that can't go out shows in Phone → Activity with the reason and still counts toward the limit.
• On the work order's Billing tab, the Deposit card says whether reminders are on and how many went out, e.g. "Text reminders on: 1 of 3 sent · every 3 days.", with a link to the settings.
• Ordinary overdue invoices still have no text; their reminders are email only.

Taxable line items and parts on the invoice

Work order line items can be marked Taxable and can come from your parts and chemicals catalog (see catalog parts and taxable line items). When the work order is billed, the invoice carries that tax automatically:

• Each line keeps its own rate, whether you use Create Invoice, invoice several at once with Invoice all ready, or use Add to Next Maintenance Invoice (the charges queued on the recurring service keep their tax too).
• Discounts reduce the tax in proportion to the lines they come off; the invoice's discount row shows "Reduces tax by $X.XX". Chemical and part rows logged at completion keep their full tax.
• A line with a quantity other than 1 reads "Pool Pump ×2" on the invoice.
• Parts are not billed twice. Parts a technician logs at completion that are already part lines on the work order are netted out; only the extra quantity bills, and Create Invoice notes the rest ("1 × Skimmer Basket already on the work order").
• Invoicing never changes part or chemical stock from line items.
• On accounts still on the legacy Stripe invoice flow, work order invoices are never taxed.

The Work Order Billing page: five stages

Open Billing in the sidebar and pick the Work Order Billing tab (or search "Work Order Billing" with ⌘K). The page is subtitled "Every work order's money, from deposit to paid". Across the top is a row of five stages; click one to show its list. The stage you pick is kept in the page address, so a view can be bookmarked.

• Deposits due: deposits you asked for that are not paid yet. A small amber note shows how many are "not sent".
• Ready to bill (the stage the page opens on): finished work orders nobody has billed yet. It is the same set and count as the badge on the Billing sidebar item. A work order with nothing to bill ($0, or a 1¢ placeholder price) is never listed here: once it is finished, it is done.
• On a maintenance bill: work orders added to a customer's next maintenance invoice that has not generated yet. An amber note shows how many "won't bill".
• Invoiced, unpaid: work order invoices you sent that still owe money. An amber note shows how many are overdue.
• Paid, last 30 days: work order invoices paid in the last 30 days.

Each stage shows its count and dollar total.

Deposits due

The Deposits due list has the columns Work order, Deposit, Work (Done or Not done yet), and Amount. Overdue deposits come first, then the biggest. Each deposit is in one of these states:

• "Not sent yet: send it from the work order": the work order is open and its deposit has not been invoiced. The row opens the work order's Billing tab, where Send deposit invoice lives.
• "Sent, waiting for payment" or "Sent, past due": the deposit invoice went out and is unpaid. The row opens the invoice.

Deposits on quotes that are not tied to a work order are not listed here.

Ready to bill: three ways to bill a finished work order

Above the Ready to bill table, a short guide names the three ways to bill:

• Invoice: send the customer an invoice for this job on its own.
• Add to maintenance bill: put the charges on their next monthly or weekly maintenance invoice, so they get one bill.
• Already billed: they paid another way (cash on the spot, another system). Clears it with no invoice.

The table has a checkbox, Work order (with its address, a Field badge for work orders created in the field, and an amber "N tasks remaining" badge when tasks are open), Customer, Finished, and Amount. The Amount is what its invoice will bill: the work order's discounts and any paid deposit taken off, and sales tax included. Notes under it read "incl. $X tax" and "after $X deposit" when they apply.

• Each row has a green Invoice button, which opens Create Invoice for that work order. The arrow next to it ("Other ways to bill") offers Add to next maintenance invoice and Mark as already billed.
• Click the Work order, Customer, or Finished column header to sort by it; click again to reverse it. Amount can't be sorted, because it is recalculated from your current prices and tax settings.
• The Search by customer, job, or address box filters the list; while you search, results are ordered by best match.
• When nothing is waiting, the list reads Nothing to bill.
• You can also bill from the work order's own page, where Create Invoice is the button at the top right once the work order is completed, and Add to Next Maintenance Invoice and Mark as Billed are in its More actions menu (⋯). See create and manage invoices for sending or charging the invoice.

Work orders with a deposit

• Work orders with a deposit are listed too. The deposit invoice does not count as the work order being invoiced. Only its final invoice takes it off the list.
• When the deposit is paid, the row's Amount has the deposit taken off, and invoicing it in bulk bills that amount.
• When the deposit hasn't been paid, the row shows the full amount with no deposit credit, the same as Create Invoice on the work order's page (which warns "Deposit hasn't been paid yet"). Creating the invoice, one at a time or in bulk, voids the open deposit invoice, so the customer is not billed twice.

Invoice several work orders at once

On Ready to bill, click Invoice all ready, or tick the rows you want and click Invoice N selected. A window titled Invoice work orders ("Creates one invoice for each work order below…") lists each work order with its customer and the amount its invoice will bill, sales tax included. When the invoices charge tax, it also breaks the total into Subtotal, the tax, any deposits already paid, and Total. Click Create N invoices and watch each one succeed (or fail) with a progress bar.

• Only work orders with all tasks complete are included. A row with a "N tasks remaining" badge can't be ticked; if the remaining tasks are intentional, use its own Invoice button.
• Each invoice uses the payment method, auto-pay, and fee-passing settings configured on its job, and paid deposits and discounts are applied automatically.
• Any failures are listed with the reason when the batch finishes, so you can fix and re-run just those.

Mark as already billed: it was paid some other way

Sometimes a finished work order was billed outside Pool Founder, for example the customer paid in cash on the spot or was billed from another system. Marking it as billed clears it from Ready to bill and the sidebar count without creating an invoice.

1. 1On Ready to bill, click the arrow next to the row's Invoice button and choose Mark as already billed. Or, on the work order's own page, click More actions (⋯, top right) and choose Mark as Billed.
2. 2Confirm. From Work Order Billing the window is titled Mark "[work order name]" as already billed?; click Mark as already billed. The work order leaves the list and the sidebar count.
3. 3Changed your mind? The work order's Overview tab shows a "Marked as Billed" banner with an Undo button.

On a maintenance bill, Invoiced unpaid, and Paid

• On a maintenance bill lists work orders added to a customer's next maintenance invoice that has not generated yet, with Work order, Added to (the recurring service, linked), Bills on (the date), and Amount. Undo is on the work order itself.
• When that maintenance invoice won't go out, Bills on shows a warning instead of a date: "Recurring service is suspended", "Recurring service was archived", "Recurring service was deleted", "Recurring service doesn't bill on a schedule", or "Its billing date passed without it". Fix the recurring service, or undo the add from the work order and bill it another way.
• Invoiced, unpaid lists work order invoices you sent that still owe money (deposit invoices are not included), overdue first: Work order, Invoice (the number; click to open it), Due (marked "(overdue)" when late), and Still owed.
• Paid, last 30 days lists work order invoices paid in the last 30 days.

Add to Next Maintenance Invoice: bill a repair on the monthly bill

A repair does not have to go out as its own invoice. On a completed work order that has not been invoiced yet, Add to Next Maintenance Invoice (in the More actions menu on the work order's own page) or Add to next maintenance invoice (in the arrow menu next to Invoice on its Ready to bill row on Work Order Billing) queues the work order's charges onto the customer's next monthly or weekly maintenance invoice, so the customer gets one bill instead of two.

1. 1Open the completed work order, click More actions (⋯, top right), and choose Add to Next Maintenance Invoice, or on Work Order Billing click the arrow next to its Invoice button and choose Add to next maintenance invoice.
2. 2A window titled "Add to the next maintenance invoice?" names the recurring service the charge will ride on and the date that invoice bills. If the property has more than one monthly or weekly recurring service, choose which one.
3. 3When that recurring service is on auto-pay, the window says so — the repair is charged to the card on file along with the rest of that invoice.
4. 4Click Add to Invoice. The work order moves from Ready to bill to On a maintenance bill and leaves the sidebar count immediately; no invoice is sent for it now.

The work order then shows a "Billing with maintenance on [date]" banner on its Overview tab with View recurring service and Undo buttons, and the Billed step of its progress tracker reads "With maintenance", so it reads as handled rather than forgotten. On the recurring service, the charge appears on the Billing tab under Charges, listed beneath the One-time charges & discounts row and labelled From work order, with a link back. When that maintenance invoice generates, the repair is on it as its own line items. The chemicals and parts the technician logged on the work order's visits come along too, charged and taxed exactly as the work order's own invoice would charge them (the amount on its Ready to bill row), so a work order whose only charges are logged chemicals can be added as well.

Changed your mind? The Undo button on the work order's banner pulls the charges back off and returns the work order to Ready to bill. Undo is available right up until the maintenance invoice generates — after that, edit the invoice itself.

When a work order has to be invoiced on its own

A few work orders have to keep their own invoice. On the work order's page, Add to Next Maintenance Invoice in the More actions menu is greyed out with the reason under it; from its Ready to bill row on Work Order Billing, Add to next maintenance invoice still opens the window, which says why instead. The reasons:

• The work order requires a deposit. The paid deposit is credited on the work order's own invoice, so those charges cannot ride along on the maintenance invoice.
• The work order came from a quote with a QuickBooks estimate. QuickBooks converts that estimate into its own invoice, so the work order keeps its own invoice too.
• There is no monthly or weekly recurring service at that property. Per-visit recurring services bill completed visits rather than on a fixed date, so there is no upcoming invoice for the repair to join — see maintenance billing modes.

In those cases use Create Invoice (or Invoice on the Ready to bill row) as normal, or Mark as Billed (Mark as already billed on the row) if you collected the money another way.

Queue a charge by hand without a work order

You can also add an ad-hoc charge straight to a customer's next bill without tracking a work order at all. Open the recurring service and, on its Billing tab under Charges, click the value on the One-time charges & discounts row (it reads Add when nothing has been added). Enter a description and amount, then click Add charge (choose Discount at the top to take money off the next bill instead; Discount only shows for roles with "Change prices & add discounts", and without that permission a charge must match a price you set on a part, chemical or service). It becomes its own line item when the next monthly or weekly invoice generates. That row only exists on monthly- or weekly-billed recurring services, not per-visit jobs — see maintenance billing modes.

Frequently asked questions

Related articles