Credit Balance

[businessowner350]

Hi Everyone,

As we are a hosting provider, we use the WHMCS billing system which generates invoices for all of our hosting customers. Customers use PayPal to pay these invoices. Some of these customer overpay their invoices, and as such, WHMCS automatically adds the overpayment to their respective credit balance.

We have recently installed Sage Instant Accounts. To "integrate" with WHMCS, we have created a single customer in Sage called "WHMCS-customer" and for invoices that are generated by WHMCS, we simply manually total up all these invoices and add a single invoice (with the total figure) to the customer in Sage. This is done on a weekly basis.

Regarding payment, we manually total up all WHMCS-related payments in our Paypal account (which is reconciled in Sage) and use the "Receive Payment" feature for the WHMCS-customer in Sage. For the purposes of Sage, this effectively merges all of our WHMCS customers together as a single customer.

However, how would we account for the credit balances in WHMCS? Should we create a new bank account in Sage called "WHMCS-Credits" and each week total up the WHMCS credits, and do the relavent transfer between the WHMCS-customer, WHMCS-credit and Paypal accounts?

We are not worried of the lack of detail in Sage regarding our WHMCS customers, as WHMCS provides good reporting tools for the individual customers, in case were ever audited.

Any help is appreciated

Thanks

 

[Searching for Perfection]

If your customers pay their invoices by Paypal and the entire payments are then enter into Sage... then automatically you have entered the overpayment from your customers .... For example Total Invoices £1000 .... payment received (Paypal including overpayment) £1050.... if you enter data in this way then you needn't to worry as Sage will show the Credit balance of Customers with -£50.


Thanks
Ron

 

[businessowner350]

Hi Ron,

Thanks for your reply however this won't work.

We don't want the overpayments to affect the balance on the account, as the overpayments don't reduce the overall liability of the "WHMCS-customer". The overpayments are added to a "Credit Balance" in WHMCS, akin to a Gift Card Balance that some shops have.

What my current train of thought is, is to have a special N/C titled "Overpayments". I will then manually add payments to the PayPal bank account in Sage against this special N/C. Then, when a customer uses soe of their credit to pay for an invoice, I will credit the "WHMCS-customer" customer in Sage against the special N/C.

How does this sound?

Thanks

 

[Geoff T]

Sounds like unnecessary work if you want the truth...

Overall benefit will be outweighed by the admin of the thing...

 

[businessowner350]

Sounds like unnecessary work if you want the truth...

Overall benefit will be outweighed by the admin of the thing...

I appreciate your opinion, but if I don't want the overpayments to affect the liability, surely my way is the only way? Is there a better way to do this?

The reason why I want the "WHMCS-customer" liability seperate from its credits, is that we have to remember that "WHMCS-customer" is an amalgamation of hundreds of customers. I want the "WHMCS-customer" to strictly refer to invoicing and paying of the invoices.

Thanks

 

[Geoff T]

but if I don't want the overpayments to affect the liability,

This is the point though - isn't it...

If you're running "open accounts" for customers then they should clearly show money in and out, and their liability as a result... to take an overpayment and not show a credit balance on their account would be to misstate the true position...

Or am I missing something?

 

[businessowner350]

This is the point though - isn't it...

If you're running "open accounts" for customers then they should clearly show money in and out, and their liability as a result... to take an overpayment and not show a credit balance on their account would be to misstate the true position...

Or am I missing something?

Sort of. I guess the key thing is that an overpayment is immediately converted into a "Gift Card"/"Store Credit" style product (which doesn't attract tax/VAT). Since the "WHMCS-customer" in sage is an amalgamation of 300 customers, we want the balance to reflect the unpaid invoice liability only, without overpayments taken into consideration.

Let's take an example:

Let us say that we have two real customers who pay via WHMCS, Customer A and Customer B.

Customer A has an invoice due worth £10.00
Customer B has an invoice due worth £20.00

Let's say Customer A pays £30, and as such, overpays by £20.
Let's say Customer B hasn't paid their invoice.

Since I'm combining both customer in Sage, if I were to simply go about the standard way you describe, the balance on the account would be £0 (£30 due, £30 in). However, the company is actually owed £20 by Customer B.

In my way (having a special Nominal Code for Overpayments), the liability of the customer account in sage would show £20, but the N/C would have a balance of £20 due to overpayment.

Maybe I'm going about this the wrong way, but do you see where my confusion lies? It's boils down to the fact that I'm merging all my WHMCS customers into a single customer in Sage...

Thanks

 

[astutiumRob]

You're over complicating it - you can see the amounts outstanding in WHMCS - why do you need to see them in Sage as well ?

 

[businessowner350]

You're over complicating it - you can see the amounts outstanding in WHMCS - why do you need to see them in Sage as well ?

It boils down to the fact that Sage will be used to create our balance sheets and as such, we need an accurate figure for money owed by creditors.

I guess I wish to treat an overpayment as a "Gift Card" product sold, hence why my reasoning for a special N/C

 

[Geoff T]

Sort of. I guess the key thing is that an overpayment is immediately converted into a "Gift Card"/"Store Credit" style product (which doesn't attract tax/VAT). Since the "WHMCS-customer" in sage is an amalgamation of 300 customers, we want the balance to reflect the unpaid invoice liability only, without overpayments taken into consideration.

Let's take an example:

Let us say that we have two real customers who pay via WHMCS, Customer A and Customer B.

Customer A has an invoice due worth £10.00
Customer B has an invoice due worth £20.00

Let's say Customer A pays £30, and as such, overpays by £20.
Let's say Customer B hasn't paid their invoice.

Since I'm combining both customer in Sage, if I were to simply go about the standard way you describe, the balance on the account would be £0 (£30 due, £30 in). However, the company is actually owed £20 by Customer B.

In my way (having a special Nominal Code for Overpayments), the liability of the customer account in sage would show £20, but the N/C would have a balance of £20 due to overpayment.

Maybe I'm going about this the wrong way, but do you see where my confusion lies? It's boils down to the fact that I'm merging all my WHMCS customers into a single customer in Sage...

Thanks

I still don't think this will work TBH... in the absence of more qualified advice - it sounds to me like "paasing on" a balance... like the credit from one customer will be used in the NC to offset anothers underpayment... and if you amalgamate overpayments, how will allow for it correctly if they buy from you again?

Surely if I overpay you for something this month, I should be able to expect to reduce next month's payment to recoup the over payment?

 

[Geoff T]

Sort of. I guess the key thing is that an overpayment is immediately converted into a "Gift Card"/"Store Credit" style product (which doesn't attract tax/VAT). Since the "WHMCS-customer" in sage is an amalgamation of 300 customers, we want the balance to reflect the unpaid invoice liability only, without overpayments taken into consideration.

Let's take an example:

Let us say that we have two real customers who pay via WHMCS, Customer A and Customer B.

Customer A has an invoice due worth £10.00
Customer B has an invoice due worth £20.00

Let's say Customer A pays £30, and as such, overpays by £20.
Let's say Customer B hasn't paid their invoice.

Since I'm combining both customer in Sage, if I were to simply go about the standard way you describe, the balance on the account would be £0 (£30 due, £30 in). However, the company is actually owed £20 by Customer B.

In my way (having a special Nominal Code for Overpayments), the liability of the customer account in sage would show £20, but the N/C would have a balance of £20 due to overpayment.

Maybe I'm going about this the wrong way, but do you see where my confusion lies? It's boils down to the fact that I'm merging all my WHMCS customers into a single customer in Sage...

Thanks

I still don't think this will work TBH... in the absence of more qualified advice - it sounds to me like "paasing on" a balance... like the credit from one customer will be used in the NC to offset anothers underpayment... and if you amalgamate overpayments, how will you allow for it correctly if they buy from you again?

Surely if I overpay you for something this month, I should be able to expect to reduce next month's payment to recoup the over payment?

 

[businessowner350]

I still don't think this will work TBH... in the absence of more qualified advice - it sounds to me like "paasing on" a balance... like the credit from one customer will be used in the NC to offset anothers underpayment... and if you amalgamate overpayments, how will allow for it correctly if they buy from you again?

Surely if I overpay you for something this month, I should be able to expect to reduce next month's payment to recoup the over payment?

There is no such thing as an "Underpayment" with regards to the N/C. Underpayments are regarded as "normal" payments are just simply reduce the "WHMCS-customer" balance in Sage.

If they buy from me again, another invoice will be generated and they will have to pay. If they have overpaid in the past, they can use their "Credit Balance" to pay some of the invoice (and if this happens, the overpayment N/C balance will be reduced). The invoices aren't automatically "reduced" if they have overpaid in the past.

I have talked this over with my accountant and he thinks that my way is ok. It's good to separate overpayments into a separate N/C in my case, as I'm amalgamating lots of customers together.

 

[Geoff T]

I have talked this over with my accountant and he thinks that my way is ok. It's good to separate overpayments into a separate N/C in my case, as I'm amalgamating lots of customers together.

ah well, far be it for me to question a beanie....