What's the Best way to Cancel an Invoice?

You can't "delete" an invoice; invoices are like herpes or Marines. You can, however, "Void" one.

Well silly me... didn't see the Void option in the Pull down (smack smack).

Thanks!

BruceF

How do you then get rid of the "unpaid" invoice and "unapplied" credit memo unless you can tick them off when another transaction is conducted with the same customer?

When you create the Credit memo you *should* be prompted to deal with the available credit: Retain as an available credit, Give a refund or Apply to an invoice. In this case the third option is the correct answer. Another box will appear prompting you to apply the CM you just created to an invoice. Check off the invoice you want to clear and click done.

If that does not work then go into Receive Payments for that customer and select the original invoice plus apply the credit memo to net to zero payment.

The end result to your books is the same as a void BUT if the original transaction was in a prior period then using void changes the financials of the prior period because it merely zeros out the existing invoice. Plus there is no audit trail. Using a CM is really the proper way of getting rid of the invoice. Plus if you need to write it off as bad debt then using the CM routine is the best way of doing that.

You CAN delete an invoice in QB but it is not recommended by many accountants since you lose the audit trail. A void or a credit memo is a better way of handling the transaction.

Thanks (and for your other messages).

I can design electrical systems and draft like heck... but accounting is still a growing pain for me (:

BruceF

Thanks. I looked it up and last time I issued a CM I was using QBfW 2.0. It did over inflate the sales for the period. I remembered that I only got it out of the reports about a year later when the customer made another purchase and I check marked them.

Another way is to make that invoice Pending, which would put it into a nonposting account, but not lose all the data you have input into the invoice.

Gary

You can delete it from the edit menu, once it's on-screen. If you have inventory items involved, you may want to handle the problem differently.

Best,

Peter