ABSS Books · Settings

Automation

Automation holds the two Auto Pay switches. With Invoice Auto Pay on, Books applies a customer's approved advances as soon as an invoice becomes Sent. Bill Auto Pay does the same with a vendor's advances when a bill becomes Open. No new payment is created.

Who it's for: Admins whose customers pay in advance, or who pay vendors in advance, and who want those advances matched without doing it by hand
Where to find it: SettingsAutomation
What you need: The Admin role

Automation walkthrough

Coming soon

What you can do here

Turn on Invoice Auto Pay, so a customer's advances are applied when an invoice becomes Sent.
Turn on Bill Auto Pay, so a vendor's advances are applied when a bill becomes Open.
Choose whether advances from any branch can be used, or only advances from the document's own branch.
Set invoices and bills separately. Each has its own switch and its own Scope.
Turn either one off again at any time.

Before you start

The Admin role: Automation is under the Automation heading in Settings. Only admins see it.
How to open Settings: Choose the Settings gear icon in the top bar. It opens All settings, where you pick Automation.
Approved advances: Auto Pay only uses money that is already recorded: a Payment Received or a Payment Made that is Approved and still has Unused Amount. With no such payment for the customer or vendor, Auto Pay has nothing to apply.
No bank or cash account: There is no account to choose on this screen. Auto Pay records no new receipt or payment. It only matches advances you already hold to what is owed.

Understand what Auto Pay does

Auto Pay does for you what Apply to Invoice and Apply to Bill do by hand: it uses unused money on approved payments against what the customer or vendor owes.

Step	Invoice Auto Pay	Bill Auto Pay
Runs when	A new invoice is saved with Save & Sent, or a Draft invoice is marked Sent.	A new bill is saved with Save & Open, or a Draft bill is marked Open.
Uses	Approved Payments Received from the same customer that still have Unused Amount, oldest payment first.	Approved Payments Made to the same vendor that still have Unused Amount, oldest payment first.
Pays first	The customer's remaining opening balance.	The vendor's remaining opening payable.
Then pays	That customer's Sent, Partially Paid and Overdue invoices that still have a balance, oldest due date first.	That vendor's Open, Partially Paid and Overdue bills that still have a balance, oldest due date first.
Stops when	The advances run out, or nothing is left to pay.	The advances run out, or nothing is left to pay.

Each amount applied lowers the balance of the invoice or bill, which becomes Partially Paid or Paid, and lowers the Unused Amount of the payment by the same amount. To see where an advance went, open the payment: the documents it was applied to are listed under Invoice Details on a Payment Received and under Bill Details on a Payment Made. You can remove an applied line there if the money went somewhere you did not intend.

Note: Auto Pay does not create a payment, so nothing is saved as Pending and nothing waits for approval. It only uses payments an Accountant has already approved.

Warning: The oldest dues are paid first. An advance can be used up by the opening balance or by an older invoice or bill before it reaches the document you just sent or opened.

Turn Auto Pay on

Invoices and bills are set separately, on the same screen.

Go to Settings → Automation
The screen shows two blocks, Invoice Auto Pay and Bill Auto Pay.
Turn on the switch you want
You can turn on one or both. A Scope choice appears under each switch that is On.
Choose the Scope
Pick All Branches or Branch Wise. See Choose the scope.
Choose Save Changes
Auto Pay runs from the next invoice that becomes Sent or the next bill that becomes Open.

Invoice Auto Pay: A switch that reads On or Off. The line under it says: Apply customer advances when an invoice is created as Sent or moves from Draft to Sent.
Bill Auto Pay: A switch that reads On or Off. The line under it says: Apply vendor advances when a bill is created as Open or moves from Draft to Open.
Scope: Shows under a switch only while that switch is On. Choose All Branches or Branch Wise. It starts on All Branches.
Save Changes: Saves both switches and both Scope choices together. Nothing changes until you choose it.

If the settings cannot be loaded, the screen shows a message and a Retry button instead of the switches.

Choose the scope

Scope decides which advances can be used when your customers or vendors have more than one branch. Invoices and bills each have their own Scope.

Scope	What the screen says	What it means
All Branches	Advances from any branch can be applied to the document.	Every branch of the customer or vendor is looked at: its opening balance and its unpaid documents.
Branch Wise	Advances are applied only when the document branch matches the advance payment branch.	Only the opening balance and the unpaid documents of that same branch are paid. A document or an advance with no branch is skipped.

Turn Auto Pay off

Turn the switch Off
The Scope choice under it is hidden.
Choose Save Changes
Advances are no longer applied for you. Amounts that Auto Pay has already applied stay as they are.

Rules to know

The rules behind this screen, in one place.

Topic	Rule
Who sees this	Admins only. Only an admin can save a change.
No new payment	Auto Pay does not create a Payment Received or a Payment Made. It applies the Unused Amount of payments that already exist, so there is nothing new to approve.
Approved payments only	A Pending, Rejected or Cancelled payment is never used. Money on a Pending payment becomes available to Auto Pay once an Accountant approves it.
Which documents	Invoices that are Sent, Partially Paid or Overdue, and bills that are Open, Partially Paid or Overdue, with a balance greater than zero. Draft, Paid and Cancelled documents are never touched.
Oldest dues first	The opening balance is cleared first, then documents by due date, oldest first. The advance can go to an older invoice or bill before the one you just sent or opened.
Same currency	An advance is applied only to documents in the same currency as the payment.
Pending payments on a document	An invoice or bill that already has a Pending payment recorded against it can be left alone until that payment is approved or deleted.
Existing documents	Turning a switch on does not run Auto Pay straight away. It runs the next time an invoice becomes Sent or a bill becomes Open.
Starting values	Both switches start Off, and Scope starts on All Branches.
The Auto Pay buttons	Auto Pay Invoices on the Payments Received list and Auto Pay Bills on the Payments Made list do the same matching when you choose them. They work whether these switches are On or Off.