We are currently generating a daily summarised invoice for a store for all orders within that day. Within the invoice we are separating this by tax amount but it has become apparent we may need to separate this by country (as well or instead of). Can we get some advice on the best way to handle this please or how others have it setup to easy handle it on the FreeAgent side?
Additionally, we have orders coming in from different payment gateways (Stripe and PayPal for example) and would likely need to process these in different bank accounts within FreeAgent, is that correct? We’re beginning to wonder if invoices are even required here at all.
Looking for advice on the best way to handle this please. Thanks!
Most of users we have on this forum are software developers looking for help building integrations using the FreeAgent API. Am I correct in understanding that your question is related to the use of the main FreeAgent app itself? If it is, I would recommend that the best thing to do would be to send your question to support@freeagent.com. One of our team of Support Accountants will then be more than happy to pick up this request for you.
If I’m wrong and you are looking for advise regarding using FreeAgent’s API, please let me know.
Thanks for the response. The questions raised were indeed for using the API. For context, this is a WordPress store and an extension for that store that connects the store to the FreeAgent account. We have been advised by your team to generate a daily invoice for all orders and were wondering how best to handle this when handling multiple payment gateways and tax regions? We have a client who has raised concerns with dealing with the current invoices as they do not seem compatible with the App itself.
Apologies for the delay in responding to you. Would you be able to provide more information regarding the compatibility issues your customer has raised? If they have been in contact with our Support Team, please DM me their subdomain and I can look into what the issues they’ve raised are.
Regarding whether and how to structure the invoices created in FreeAgent, I would recommend that you either raise this with our Support Team or an accountant. The way invoices are raised has variable accounting effects which will depend on the exact use case your clients are expecting.
Additionally, we have orders coming in from different payment gateways (Stripe and PayPal for example) and would likely need to process these in different bank accounts within FreeAgent, is that correct? We’re beginning to wonder if invoices are even required here at all.
Once an invoice is raised in FreeAgent, it will need to be associated to one or more bank transaction explanations for that invoice to be marked as paid. Each explanation will also need to be associated to a bank account. When created via the API, the bank account for an explanation can either be set specifically, or through linking the explanation to an existing bank transaction.
Generally I’d expect your clients to have bank accounts setup in FreeAgent for each bank account they are sending or receiving money from - including through payment gateways. I.e. if Stripe is depositing the order payments in a business current account, I’d expect said business current account to have a bank account listed in FreeAgent. If the transactions are going into a secondary account, such as a specific PayPal account, these are often present in FreeAgent too. PayPal accounts in FreeAgent are created differently from standard bank accounts as they have specific requirements such as email_address which is necessary to setup an automatic bank feed.
I hope that some of this is useful for you. Please let me know if you have any follow up questions.
Apologies if the initial request was unclear, but for clarity we are the developers of the WooCommerce integration listed at FreeAgent integrations - FreeAgent
We currently integrate by raising a single daily invoice assigned to a ‘WooCommerce’ containing all of the days sales, grouped by tax rate. We are now looking to add support for EU/non-EU VAT to our extension, and have been advised by the product team to raise any questions on this forum.
There will be certain differences based on the exact location of the business owner within the UK and whether they are shipping goods or delivering services, but on the whole, would it be appropriate to raise a separate invoice and customer per country? Alternatively, is it possible to just create an invoice set with the appropriate VAT Option/EC Status, and add them all to the same ‘WooCommerce’ customer, and if we do it this way, will it hook in correctly with VAT reporting behind the scenes within FreeAgent itself?
I hope that this is clear. Please let me know if you have any questions regarding what we are attempting to achieve
would it be appropriate to raise a separate invoice and customer per country?
I’m not sure I follow what you mean by customer in this situation. In FreeAgent terms would this apply to a separate Contact, or if there are multiple customers per in invoice do you perhaps mean an Invoice Item?
Alternatively, is it possible to just create an invoice set with the appropriate VAT Option/EC Status, and add them all to the same ‘WooCommerce’ customer, and if we do it this way, will it hook in correctly with VAT reporting behind the scenes within FreeAgent itself?
I assume by an “invoice set”, you are referring to a an Invoice with associated Invoice Items? If this is the case, and a WooCommerce customer refers to a Contact on the FreeAgent account, then yes this should automatically be included in FreeAgent’s VAT calculations. To set the VAT Option/EC status you should use the ec_status field on the Invoice. Whilst the sales_tax_rate can be set on the individual invoice items.