If you are using a ledger without a native connection to Ignition, you can still use Ignition but there are a few nuances to know about.

This article will guide you on the main workflows we suggest you implement, which are:

The Billing Schedule tab is where you can view the future billing of that specific client.

You can use this as a reference for upcoming billing for your clients.

Once a proposal has been accepted, you can use the Billing Schedule to manually schedule your client’s invoices in your ledger. For example, if the proposals are due to be billed monthly (Ignition), create a monthly recurring invoice (your ledger).

The Invoices tab is where you can view the past billing of that specific client. You can use this information to manually create your invoices in your ledger, as the Invoices tab will display the invoice total and the services as line items.

If you're using Ignition payments, you can set your collection schedule under Settings → Payments tab. These settings control how many days the system will wait until the payment collection process occurs.

Manual Payment Terms apply to any invoices that need to be generated manually by a user within the Billed Manually section of a client's Billing Schedule tab. (e.g. On Completion billing, Estimate billing)

Automatic Payment Terms apply to any invoices that are automatically created by Ignition, or billing items within the Billed Automatically section of a client's Billing Schedule tab. (e.g. Recurring, On Acceptance billing).

We recommend that you align your collection schedule in Ignition with your invoicing terms (in your ledger). Consider shorter collection terms to ensure you get paid faster and also make sure to review your ledger's invoice reminders to align with your collection schedule in Ignition.

For example: In a 14-day scenario, if a client signs their Ignition proposal on the 1st of the month and they have entered their payment details, then the payment will be scheduled for the 15th of the month. You could consider reducing this to 7 days for Manual Billing and even shorter (e.g. same day or 1 day) for Automatic Billing.
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With Ignition payments, generate a payment link to include with your manual invoices. Clients can review, pay instantly, and trigger immediate collection.

To generate a payment link:

Click into a specific invoice you'd like to collect payment for and click Share link.

Then, copy and paste the link to your invoice.

Navigate to your Payments → Collections → Outstanding tab to view all the invoices that have been created in Ignition that are currently unpaid.

You can use filters to manipulate the data that you need to view.

We suggest using this tab to keep record of all the invoices that have not yet been paid from your clients and following up accordingly.

Click here to learn more about the Outstanding tab.

If you have collected payment for your invoices outside of Ignition, you can manually mark invoices as paid in Ignition to accurately track, manage and report on your all of your payments.

To manually mark an invoice as paid, navigate to your client's file in Ignition → Invoices tab → click the three dots → click Mark as paid.

Next, select the date paid → select Payment method → add a Reference.

Once an invoice is marked manually:

Click here to learn more about the marking invoice as paid process.

Ignition payments is our dedicated payments processor which can be attached to the proposals you create and send through Ignition.

You can collect billing details from your clients directly on your proposals and automatically process payments through the Ignition payment gateway.

The Payouts tab contains all of the lump sum payments that have been processed to be deposited into your bank account. These lump sums often contain multiple client payment collections which get transferred once a day to your bank account.

You can use the details from payouts to reconcile your invoices in your ledger.

You can also navigate to Payments → Payouts → Export to generate invoices based on payment records from the Payouts report (e.g. monthly or weekly).

When you do this, you will be presented with a pop-up where you can select a specific date range and export type. Learn more about the payouts export here.

There are two different types of export types:

This method works best if all your payments are processed through Ignition.

If you are used to billing out time on jobs, you might be wondering how to perform WIP wash-ups if you're using Ignition.

Here are a few options:

Option 1: Connect a compatible ledger to Ignition anyway and let Ignition automatically create invoices in that ledger (i.e. from the Client Billing Schedule) and send these out to clients. In addition, you can benefit from the auto-reconciliation of payments in the Ignition compatible ledger too.

Then, use those Ignition ledger invoices as a basis for creating ‘dummy’ invoices in your ledger which mop up the time on the job.

Option 2: If no Ignition compatible ledger is connected, create the invoices in your own chosen ledger manually and send them out to the client there. Create the invoices from the time on the job. Then amend the total (based on the Client Billing Schedule values as above) before sending it to the client.