Apply Payment to Estimated SOP Invoice Amount 1

[lesterturtle81]

We are a service firm without inventory, but utilize SOP invoices to create our monthly commissions from our clients. We create a monthly SOP invoice for each client with an estimated amount and post for aging purposes. We are paid on a 2 month lag, so we learn 2 months later that the actual amount was higher or lower that our estimate. When the amount is lower that our estimate, we are issuing credit memos to offset this balance. When the amount is higher, we are currently creating an additional invoice so the payment is applied to multiple invoices. Is this the most efficient way to manage this situation? Would debit memos offer us a better solution? The only catch is that we need the credit and/or debit memo applied to a particular document, not at the customer level.

 

[VictoriaYudin]

I wouldn't say there is anything wrong with your current approach, as it accomplishes the accounting correctly. Hard to say if it's the most efficient without knowing a lot more detail.

What is the reasoning behind using SOP (as opposed to a Receivables invoice)? Are you using different line items or other functionality in SOP to track something that needs to be reported on?

Victoria Yudin
Dynamics GP MVP 2005 - 2009
Flexible Solutions - home of GP Reports

http://www.flex-solutions.com/gpreports.html

blog:

http://victoriayudin.com

 

[lesterturtle81]

Thanks for your response. I don't know all the background information for why we are using SOP versus Receivables, but it did have to do with the data we need to report. Some of our invoices have a unit cost x number of people, while others are a flat cost per month. I think the SOP invoices achieved the best result.

The hard part about our current approach is identifying how a particular invoice was paid. For any given customer, we could have 10+ invoices a month, but we may only receive 2-3 payments to post to these invoices. When you look at the Customer Inquiry, you can see the "Amount Remaining" field to see if the invoice has a balance, but to back into which payment applied to the invoice requires us to open each Payment record or run a trial balance. Is there an easier way to identify on the SOP invoice itself which payment was applied?

Thanks again!

 

[VictoriaYudin]

I think there are 2 different questions here:

1. What's the best way to enter the transactions? Sounds like you have to use SOP for the line item detail and reporting. If that's the case, I would recommend using SOP Returns and Invoices for the adjustments or true ups. That way, if you are actually tracking 'items' and quantities for any kind of analysis, it would give you the most accurate information.

2. How to identify what transactions were applied to what payment/credit/return? On a one by one basis, if you are looking at a transaction on the customer transactions inquiry window, you can click on the Amount Remaining hyperlink to see the list of transactions applied. However, on a more global basis, you may be better off creating a report. Here is a SQL view I published with code for this:

http://victoriayudin.com/2010/02/15/sql-view-with-ar-apply-detail/.

Hope that helps.

Victoria Yudin
Dynamics GP MVP 2005 - 2009
Flexible Solutions - home of GP Reports

http://www.flex-solutions.com/gpreports.html

blog:

http://victoriayudin.com

 

[lesterturtle81]

Thanks Victoria! I may have a few follow-up questions, but let me pass this on to our CFO and see what her thoughts are. I will definitely check out your SQL view as well. Thanks again!