Posts Tagged: invoicing

New Invoicing Features

We’re introducing a number of invoicing features in out next update. These are in addition to the new deposit invoice features we outlined previously. Here’s a brief outline of new invoicing features in MIDAS v4.21…


Mark invoices as complete even if not paid in full

After invoices are produced in MIDAS, administrative users may freely edit their content up until the point when the invoice is either printed or emailed to the client. At this point, MIDAS assumes that the invoice has been “finalized” and therefore locks it from further editing.

This ensures that the invoice printed/emailed to the client exactly matches the invoice stored within MIDAS.

Finalized invoices indicate the invoice total, the amount already paid (which initially will be zero), and total still due. The total still due is the invoice total minus the amount already paid against it.

Until the “total due” reaches zero (i.e. the invoice has been paid in full), the invoice will continue to be flagged as “outstanding”. It then subsequently becomes “overdue” if the length of the specified payment term is exceeded.

However, we’ve heard from customers that there are instances when they would like to mark an invoice as complete, even if there is still an amount outstanding on it. An example case might be where a client has been invoiced for the use of 4 venues, but when it came to it, they actually only used 3.

Of course, one solution to this would be to invoice the client after their booking(s) have taken place. That way you can ensure that they’re only invoiced for their actual usage of your facilities. However, we appreciate that this isn’t always possible. There are some customers who prefer to invoice their clients in advance of their bookings taking place.

That’s why for v4.21 we’re introducing a way to mark an unpaid/partially paid invoice as complete.

When updating an invoice’s status, there’ll now be an optional “Mark outstanding amount as credit?” tick box. If selected when updating an invoice’s status, the outstanding balance on the invoice will be marked as a “credit” on the invoice. This will reduce the “total due” to zero and mark the invoice as complete.


Quickly “copy” the contents of an invoice to a new invoice

Wouldn’t it be great if you could “clone” (copy) the contents of an existing invoice to a new blank invoice?

Well starting with MIDAS v4.21 you’ll be able to do just that!

Simply view the invoice you’d like to copy and click/tap the new “Clone Invoice” icon. After confirming that you’d like to copy to the contents of the current invoice to a new invoice, MIDAS will create a brand-new invoice. This new invoice will be identical to the current invoice, but without an invoice date and without any payment marked against it.

As the new invoice doesn’t have an invoice date (because it hasn’t been finalized), its contents may be freely edited.

We’re sure this feature will save time for our customers who regularly produce similar or recurring invoices for their clients.


The “Pay invoice online” features can now be configured to allow partial payments

Until now, the “Pay Invoice Online” features of MIDAS, which allow your clients to pay their invoices online, would only allow clients to pay invoice in full.

If a customer wished to make a partial payment, an administrator would need to manually process their payment. Then, the administrator can manually update the status of the invoice within MIDAS to reflect the partial amount paid.

The good news is that for v4.21 we’re introducing a new “Allow Partial Invoice Payments” setting.

If enabled, this setting allows your clients to enter an amount they wish to pay against their invoice, rather than the only option being to pay it in full.

Of course if the new “Allow Partial Invoice Payments” setting isn’t enabled, then the online payments feature of MIDAS will behave as in previous versions. It will then only allow invoices to be paid in full.

We want to provide our customers the most flexible and versatile invoicing features in a booking system we can. So we’re sure that the exciting improvements to invoicing coming in our next update will be great additions!


Deposit Invoices

It may be a new year, but we’ve been hard at work on the next update (v4.21) to our room booking and resource scheduling system. We’re giving you a “first look” here on the blog at some of the upcoming features you can expect.

Invoicing has been a staple feature of our software for many years. Following customer feedback, for v4.08 we expanded the invoice generation capabilities of MIDAS to also allow generating “Cancellation Invoices“.

This feature automatically charges a cancellation fee to your clients and generates an invoice accordingly if their bookings are cancelled (removed from the system) at very short notice.

This has been well-received by customers, many of whom have also asked for the ability for their MIDAS system to generate “deposit” invoices too.

Well, we’ve listened, and are excited to announce that “Deposit Invoices” are finally coming in MIDAS v4.21!

When generating invoices for bookings and deposit invoicing is enabled, MIDAS will instead generate two invoices; the usual “regular” invoice and a separate “deposit” invoice.

Deposit Invoice Settings in MIDAS v4.21
Deposit Invoice Settings in MIDAS v4.21

The amount charged on a deposit invoice can be customized. It can either be set to a fixed amount, or as a percentage of the overall total booking cost.

Furthermore, there’s also the option to deduct the value of the “deposit” invoice from the “regular” invoice. In not selected, the deposit charge will be in addition to the main booking/hire charge.


Invoicing Improvements

The forthcoming update to MIDAS – our popular room booking and resource scheduling system – includes a handful of small, but nonetheless useful, updates and improvements to the extensive Invoicing capabilities of the software.

We often receive ideas and suggestions from our customers as to what new features and improvements they’d like to see. May of these suggestions relate to the invoicing capabilities of MIDAS. Taking these on board, our next update (v4.19) will feature…


A new “View Only” option for the “Can use invoicing” user permission

Existing MIDAS administrators will know of the powerful set of permissions that can assigned to accounts on a per-user basis.

One of the available permissions is the “Can use invoicing” setting. This setting allows administrators to allow/deny each user the ability access to MIDAS’ Invoicing features.

Previously, this permission had three possible settings:

  • No – User has no access to any of the invoicing features
  • Yes – User has full access to all of the invoicing features
  • Limited – User may create/generate invoices, but may only view/modify/delete invoices which they created/generated. (They will not have access to invoices added by other users)

For v4.19 we’re adding a forth option to this permission – “View Only“. User’s who’s “Can use invoicing” permission has been set to “View Only” will be able to view all invoices, but will not be able to modify, delete, email or print them, nor will they be able to generate or create new invoices.

This new option is useful to organizations who wish to grant “read only” access to their invoices, for example, for the purposes of auditing.


Exporting invoice summaries in Excel format will format “Invoice Dates” as Excel dates (rather than as text)

In the previous update to MIDAS (v4.18), we introduced the ability to export invoice summaries in native Excel (.xlsx) format.

We’re made a small improvement to this for v4.19. Invoice dates will now be formatted as Excel dates rather than as regular text strings.

This allows for easier manipulation/format of dates when viewing your exported invoice summaries in Excel.


Tax Amount and Grand Total fields become editable

After generating or create a new invoice in MIDAS, its contents may be modified prior to “finalizing” it. A “Finalized” invoice is one which has been printed/emailed to the client.

When editing invoices, by default, MIDAS will automatically re-calculate totals when you make changes. For example, if you charge $50/hour for room hire and you’ve invoiced for 2 hours, the line total on the invoice would be $100. If you then manually change the quantity from 2 to 3 hours, MIDAS will automatically re-calculate the line total of the invoice to $150, and the grand total of the invoice accordingly.

A small “Calculate Totals” tick box is present when modifying invoices. If un-ticked this will prevent MIDAS from automatically calculating totals, allowing you to specify manual amounts if necessary.

However, in earlier version, with the “Calculate Totals” box un-ticked whilst you could modify item rates, quantities, line totals, and tax rate, the tax amount value and grand total values would still be automatically calculated and couldn’t be manually adjusted.

We’ve changed this for v4.19 so that when the “Calculate Totals” box un-ticked, you’ll be able to manually modify the value of any field on your invoice.


We’ve also made one other small change relating to invoices for v4.19. This relates to the way that a client’s “Paid in Full” and “Outstanding” invoices were displayed in the Booking Information Panel.

Previously, these lists were sorted in ascending order. This meant that the client’s oldest paid invoice would appear at the top of the list “Paid in Full” list of invoices.

We’ve changed this sort behavior to descending order for v4.19. Now, the client’s most recently paid/outstanding invoices will be shown at the top (rather than the end) of each respective list.


Click here to continue reading about some of the other new & improved features in MIDAS v4.19!


New Advanced Invoice Generation Filter

If you follow our blog, you’ll already be aware of some of the exciting new features on the horizon with MIDAS v4.16. Our previous post looked at new filter options when it comes to generating printouts of your bookings.

We’re also adding a similar filter when it comes to generating invoices from your bookings:

Advanced Invoice Generation Filter
Advanced Invoice Generation Filter

This provides additional flexibility to allow you to only generate invoices which include bookings that match specific filter criteria.

For example, as per the screenshot above, you can generate invoices only for bookings which have more than ten attendees.

The advanced filter allows you to choose a booking field (including any custom booking fields you’ve set up), select a match type, and enter a match string.

Match types available include:

  • Equals – Will include bookings where the selected booking field’s value exactly matches the string you enter.
  • Does Not Equal – Will include bookings where the selected booking field’s value doesn’t exactly match the string you enter.
  • Contains – Will include bookings where the selected booking field’s value contains an occurrence of the string you enter.
  • Does Not Contain – Will include bookings where the selected booking field’s value contains no occurrences of the string you enter.
  • Begins With – Will include bookings where the selected booking field’s value begins with the string you enter.
  • Ends With – Will include bookings where the selected booking field’s value ends with the string you enter.
  • Is Greater Than – Will include bookings where the selected booking field’s numeric value is higher than the value you enter.
  • Is Less Than – Will include bookings where the selected booking field’s numeric value is higher than the value you enter.

These powerful new filter options for both printout and invoice generation offer a whole new level of flexibility to your MIDAS system, and we’re sure they’ll be put to great use by our customers!

Click here to continue reading about some of the other new & improved features coming in MIDAS v4.16!