Financial Cents gives you five ways to invoice clients depending on how your firm bills. You can create and save invoices as drafts at any time, but sending and collecting online payments requires a completed billing application. If you haven't set up billing yet, see How to Set Up Billing in Financial Cents.
Invoice Methods
One-time: a single invoice sent manually for a fixed amount. Best for project milestones, ad hoc charges, or any one-off billing.
Recurring: invoices that generate and send automatically on a set schedule. Best for monthly retainers and subscription-based services.
Unbilled Time: invoice clients for time your team has already logged. All unbilled entries are tracked in Billing > Unbilled. See Unbilled Time, WIP (Work in Progress).
Signed Proposal: when a client accepts a proposal, invoices are generated based on the service type (one-time, recurring, hourly, or deposit) set on each service in the proposal. See Proposals & Engagement Letters.
Project-Based Billing: link invoices to a project to track billed amounts against a budget and view realization data at the engagement level.
Creating Invoices
To create an invoice:
From any page, click + Create in the top-left corner and select Invoice.
From the Invoices list, navigate to Billing > Invoices and click Create Invoice.
Invoice fields:
Field | Description |
Invoice Template | Optional. Select a saved template to pre-fill the invoice. |
Client | The client you're billing. |
Contacts | One or more contacts at the client to receive the invoice. |
Mark Internal | Flags the invoice as internal only — it won't be sent to the client. |
Frequency | One-time or Recurring. Recurring adds schedule fields: frequency (Weekly, Monthly, Yearly), day, interval, first invoice date, due date, and optional end date. |
Invoice Date | Defaults to today. Adjust to backdate if needed. |
Due Date | When payment is due. Defaults to your account setting. |
Payment Collection | Send invoice to client emails the invoice. Auto-charge client charges their saved payment method on the due date. |
Allowed Payment Methods | ACH transfer, credit/debit card, and partial payments — enable or disable per invoice. |
Associate Projects | Link the invoice to a project for realization tracking. |
Client Reminders | How often automated reminder emails are sent for unpaid invoices. |
More Options | Invoice description and client billing address, both printed on the invoice. |
Adding Line Items
Action | Description |
Add Row | Add a manual line item with service, description, qty, rate, and tax. |
Add unbilled time | Pull in logged time entries for the selected client. |
Group line items | Organize rows under a named section heading. |
Add discount | Apply a saved discount code to the invoice total. |
Line items can be reordered by dragging the handle on the left of each row. The invoice summary shows Subtotal, Discounts, Total, and Amount due.
Sending and Saving
Action | What it does |
Preview & Send | Preview the invoice, then send immediately or schedule a send date. |
Save Draft | Save without sending. Return to it anytime from Billing > Invoices. |
Save As Template | Save the current configuration as a reusable invoice template. |
Customize | Toggle which columns appear on this invoice (service, qty, rate, amount, tax). |
ℹ️Heads up. If a client has no email address on file, Financial Cents will prompt you to add one or proceed without sending an email notification.