If a project takes longer than scheduled or ends earlier than planned and billing can be done only at the end without a preset date, then you must be careful with scheduling a bill for submission and payment. There are other times too when you cannot follow a preset date, examples include: dropped projects, unexpected departure of a consultant (subcontractor), or a customer consistently failing to honor payment. Delinquency can be really troublesome to tackle but putting a plan in advance can lessen the pain of making a settlement for mutual benefit.
There are several options available to bring an amicable settlement, but foreseeing and preparing for the worst case scenario for billing should be provided for even before the staffing companies start to initiate their part of work.
Here a few case scenarios where billing has to be initiated before the billing cycle due date.
Early Amicable Completion
If you have CONSULT® integrated with your QuickBooks accounting software, then there isn’t anything that you need to do. If you prefer you can start the billing work on the scheduled billing date and proceed without having to do anything. However, you must make a proper timesheet entry for each consultant who worked on the project. It is important to know that each consultant or subcontractor worked and their roles in the project ended on different dates. Timesheets entries will tell you when to set off the process. You cannot submit an invoice earlier than the one mentioned in the agreement and you had entered the same in the CONSULT® dashboard.
If you need to make any alteration to the contract terms and conditions then you must get a contract redrafted and then change the billing date in the CONSULT® dashboard. If timesheet entries match and the billing date is reset then printing the invoice is only a matter of a few keystrokes.
Project Dropped by Customers
There are few times when the customer may want to exit from the project due to persistent irresolvable issues cropping up. The most preferred solution is to determine a payment date from your customer and reset the billing date. It can be the original billing date, an advanced date, or a postponed date as was decided during the resolving process. To give effect to a new condition you must reset the discount/penalty calculation in your CONSULT® dashboard.
It is also possible to foresee all potential points of conflict during the middle of a project and make entries in the dashboard. The dashboard in CONSULT® is a powerful tool to make changes and generate invoices automatically. Scheduling a date is the best thing that you can do because it is potentially the most likely part that your billing team can miss.
How CONSULT® Works
When you have CONSULT® integrated with QuickBooks, you can schedule an earlier date for billing based on the condition you set. So, if you foresee an early completion possibility, change the billing cycle in CONSULT® so that you will not be impacted by billing dates. With CONSULT® integrated into QuickBooks, you are guaranteed not to miss a single. CONSULT® won’t let it happen!
