When you set up monthly budgets for a project, you’ll be given the option to set up scheduled invoicing for that project. This means that BigTime can automatically generate invoices on a monthly or quarterly basis, eliminating the need for you to manually create invoices for that project.
To set up scheduled invoicing for a project, first go to MY COMPANY…PROJECT LIST and open your chosen project. Then, go to the BUDGETS tab, and click on the ALLOCATIONS sub-tab.
NOTE: You will only see the BUDGETS tab in your project details window if you have already set your project’s budget style as Project Budget. This article will walk you through that process. The following steps also assume that you already have monthly budgets set up for your project, so if you still need to create those, read this article first.
Scroll to the bottom of this window and click on the EDIT button.
In the budget allocations editor, find and click on the MONTHLY BUDGET ($) hyperlink.
This will open a window where you can fill out details about project budgets for each month. Below the monthly budget fields you’ll see a checkbox labeled SCHEDULE INVOICING. Checking this box will generate several new fields, which we’ll explain in the next section of this article.
Scheduled Invoicing Fields
INVOICE START DATE: This is the date that you'd like BigTime to begin automatically generating invoices.
FREQUENCY: This is where you can choose how frequently you’d like your invoices to be generated. You can either choose to have invoices automatically generated on a monthly basis, or on a quarterly basis. If you choose QUARTERLY in this field, BigTime will create one invoice for this project every three months.
INVOICE TIMING: This field lets you set when exactly you’d like your invoices to be generated during the period you set in the frequency field. You can choose to have invoices created either on the first day of the month/quarter, or the last day of the month/quarter.
CURRENT, PRIOR, OR NEXT: This field determines what months/quarters are being invoiced for based on how you set up your Invoice Timing settings. You can choose to have BigTime bill for either the prior, current or following month.
To illustrate how this field works, let's say you have project budgets set up for January through May. Each month is budgeted as follows:
January = $2,500
February = $1,500
March = $2,500
April = $5,000
You set your INVOICE TIMING field to “1st of the Month/Quarter”, and set the CURRENT, PRIOR OR NEXT field as Bill Prior Month/Quarter. This means, if BigTime creates an invoice on February 1st, the invoice will contain the budget you set up for January (the month prior). The next invoice on March 1st will be $1,500 (February’s budget), and your April 1st invoice will be $2,500 (March’s budget).
INVOICE STYLE: This is where you can select what style or template you’d like BigTime to follow when creating your scheduled invoices. When you click the GRAY ARROW in this field, you’ll see a picklist with all your firm’s invoice templates.
Beside these fields, you’ll also see a checkbox labeled CLEAR WIP FOR MONTHLY/QUARTERLY PERIOD(S). Checking this box will tell BigTime to clear any WIP invoices for the months/quarters that you’re invoicing for.
From here, you can click the blue APPLY button to save your changes and prompt BigTime to start creating scheduled invoices. Every time BigTime creates a scheduled invoice, your firm's financial admin(s) will receive a notification in their notification center that will include a link to the invoice drafts, as well as the number of scheduled invoices that have been created.