Configure payment settings for vendors and clients

Introduction

To receive payments from clients and pay your vendors, you need to configure several settings on the XTRF Home Portal:

  • Payment types → general types of payment methods you allow in XTRF, e.g., Wire Transfer, PayPal, or Credit Card. Payment types are applied to both outgoing and incoming payments.

  • Payment methods → payment types to which the necessary details are added, such as account number, currency, owner's name, etc.

  • Payment terms → paying schemes with necessary details such as when and what amount of money you need to pay or will receive.
    For example, in the 50% after job completion payment terms for vendors, two payments will be defined: 50% of the invoice total after job completion and 50% of the invoice total at the end of the month. In the Full payment 7 days after invoice date payment terms for clients, a single payment of 100% of the invoice total will be defined.

  • Payment plans → names for general approaches to handling payments, e.g., Prepayment, Installment, or Pay in full.

Payment plans and terms are not linked to payment types or methods.

While adding client or vendor invoices, you will use Payment terms to define the scheme of payments and a Payment method to define how exactly (by a card, a bank transfer, a crypto wallet, etc.) the client will pay you or you will pay the vendor.

The terms and the methods can also be reflected on the actual invoices.


I. Configure payment details (types and methods)

Define payment types

To create a payment method, you need to add an appropriate payment type to the system. To do so, perform the following steps:

  1. Sign in to the XTRF Home Portal.

  2. Go to the Configuration menu → System Values: Advanced → Payment Types.

  3. Click the Add button on top of the Payment Types table. You will be directed to the Add Payment Type page.

  4. In the Name field, provide the name of the new payment type.

  5. Decide whether this payment type should be Active and thus selectable.

  6. Decide whether this payment type should be marked as a Preferred Item and thus appear on top of the drop-down lists.

  7. Decide whether this payment type should be a Default one.

  8. Click the Save button. Two additional sections appear.

  9. In the New Custom Field Name section, provide the name of the field that is required for this payment type and click the Add button. This new field will appear in the Custom Fields section above.

  10. Add all the necessary custom fields (e.g., account number, contact details, etc.). Use the icons to set the order of the custom fields.

  11. Click the Save button.

Define payment methods for clients

Accepting payments from clients

To define how the clients will pay you, perform the following steps:

  1. Go to the Configuration menu → System Values: Basic → Payment Methods.

  2. Click the Add button on top of the Payment Methods table. You will be directed to the Add Payment Method page.
    The fields on the Add Payment Method page depend on the selected payment type and may differ significantly.

  3. From the Payment Type drop-down list, select the appropriate payment type.

  4. In the Name field, provide a name for the new payment method

  5. Decide whether this method should be Active and thus selectable.

  6. Decide whether this method should be marked as a Preferred Item and thus appear on top of the drop-down lists.

  7. Decide whether this method should be a Default one.

  8. Provide the Account Owner Name and address data of the account owner.

  9. In the Custom Fields tab or other available tabs, provide the required data (the tabs and fields will differ depending on the selected payment type).

  10. Click the Save button.

Now you can select the newly created payment method while adding a client invoice.

Paying your clients

Sometimes, you might need to send a payment to a client, for example, to make a return or correct a mistake. As each client will have different payment details, the payment methods in this case are defined in client profiles.

The payment methods set in clients' profiles are not selectable on the XTRF Platform; they serve informational purposes only.

To define a payment method for the selected client, perform the following steps:

  1. Go to the client's profile → Main Data tab → Invoicing subtab → Payment Methods subtab.

  2. Click the Edit button.

  3. Click the Add button on top of the Payment Methods table. The Add Payment Methods pop-up appears.

    The fields on the Add Payment Method page depend on the selected payment type and may differ significantly.

  4. From the Payment Type drop-down list, select the appropriate payment type.

  5. In the Name field, provide a name for the new payment method

  6. Decide whether this method should be Active and thus selectable.

  7. Decide whether this method should be marked as a Preferred Item and thus appear on top of the drop-down lists.

  8. Decide whether this method should be a Default one.

  9. Provide the Account Owner Name and address data of the account owner.

  10. In the Custom Fields tab or other available tabs, provide the required data (the tabs and fields will differ depending on the selected payment type).

  11. Click the Apply button.

  12. Click the Save button.

Define payment methods for vendors

Payment methods for vendors are created per vendor in vendors' profiles or directly on the vendor invoice page. To define a payment method for the selected vendor, perform the following steps:

  1. Go to the vendor's profile → Main Data tab → Invoicing subtab → Payment Methods subtab.

  2. Click the Edit button.

  3. Click the Add button on top of the Payment Methods table. The Add Payment Methods pop-up appears.

    The fields on the Add Payment Method page depend on the selected payment type and may differ significantly.

  4. From the Payment Type drop-down list, select the appropriate payment type.

  5. In the Name field, provide a name for the new payment method

  6. Decide whether this method should be Active and thus selectable.

  7. Decide whether this method should be marked as a Preferred Item and thus appear on top of the drop-down lists.

  8. Decide whether this method should be a Default one.

  9. Provide the Account Owner Name and address data of the account owner.

  10. In the Custom Fields tab or other available tabs, provide the required data (the tabs and fields will differ depending on the selected payment type).

  11. Click the Apply button.

  12. Click the Save button.

Now you can select the newly created payment method while adding a client invoice.

Alternatively, you can add a payment method for a vendor directly on the Vendor Invoice page. To do so, open or create the invoice for the selected vendor and click the Add button in the Payment Method section. Then follow steps 4-11 as described above. This payment method will be automatically added to the vendor profile.


II. Configure payment schedule (terms and plans)

After you have defined the financial details required to receive money from clients and send payments to vendors, you need to decide on which terms this should happen, i.e., set up client and vendor-specific payment schedules (payment terms). Payment terms list all payments that should be made to cover an invoice. For each listed payment, you define a name, then when and how much should be paid.

On the Home Portal, you can define payment terms on two levels:

  • In the Configuration menu → Clients and Vendors – Global payment terms that can later be selected in projects and invoices

  • In Vendor and Client profiles → Main Data → Invoicing → Payment Terms – vendor and client-specific payment terms.

Additionally, you can edit payment terms from the invoice level (those changes will be invoice-specific and will not affect global or vendor/client-specific payment terms).

Define payment terms for vendors and clients

Each XTRF instance has three built-in payment terms applicable to all of your clients and vendors (Global payment terms):

  • 50% after task completion, the rest - 30 days after invoice date

  • Full payment 7 days after invoice date

  • Full payment at the end of the month.

However, you might need to use another payment scheme and therefore create custom payment terms on global, individual, or invoice levels.

Global payment terms

You need to add clients' and vendors' payment terms separately.

To create universal payment terms to use throughout the system, perform the following steps:

  1. Go to the Configuration menu → Clients and Vendors → Client settings → Payment Terms tab or Configuration menu → Clients and Vendors → Vendor settings → Payment Terms tab.

  2. Click the Edit button at the bottom of the page.

  3. In the Global Vendor (Client) Payment Terms section, click the Add button (to edit existing payment terms, click the icon). The Add Global Vendor (Client) Payment Terms pop-up window appears.

  4. Provide the Name for the new payment terms.

  5. Decide whether you want these terms to be:

    1. Active, i.e., available for selection on the Home Portal.

    2. Preferred Item, i.e., displayed on top of the drop-down lists.

    3. Default, i.e., selected by default while adding new entities.

  6. In the Payment Definition section, you can actually create the payment scheme (when and what percent of the invoice total should be received or sent). By default, a Standard Payment (100 % of the invoice total paid at the invoice date) is provided. To change it, click the button. To add a new payment, click the Add button. The Add Payment Definition pop-up appears.
    If you want your invoices to be paid in parts, you will need to create a payment definition for each planned payment.

    1. From the Payment Plan drop-down list, select the desired plan name. To learn how to create payment plans, see the Define payment plans section below.

    2. Provide the percentage of the invoice total. For example, enter 50% for each payment definition if you plan two even payments.

    3. Select the Reference Date: invoice date, job deadline date, or task deadline date.

    4. (Optional) Check the End of the Month box to create invoices at the end of the same month as the reference date.

    5. (Optional) Select the number of the month and/or days you want to add to the reference date.

    6. Click the Apply button.

  7. In the Localized Description Expression section, you can add specific description expressions to the financial documents or use expressions to localize financial terms. For example, if you want to send invoices to vendors from France in French instead of your default language, you need to change the "invoice" term to the "facture."

    1. To add a new localized description expression, click the Add button. The Description Expression pop-up appears.

    2. Select the Language to which the changes will apply.
      Leave the Default language to add expressions to the documents that are sent to vendors with no specific language assigned.

    3. Provide the desired expression using the tags listed below

    4. Click the Save button.

  8. Click the Save button.

Now the newly added payment terms can be selected in projects, invoices, and client or vendor profiles.

Client and vendor-specific payment terms

To create custom payment terms for the selected clients and vendors, perform the following steps:

  1. Go to the Vendor or Client profile → Main Data tab → Invoicing subtab → Payment Terms subtab,

  2. Click the Edit button.

  3. In the Payment Terms > Default Payment Terms section, click the Add button. The Add Client (Vendor) Payment Terms pop-up window will appear.

  4. Add new payment terms as described in steps 4-8 of the previous section.

Now you can select the newly created vendor or client-specific payment terms in invoices or projects that involve this vendor or client.

(Optional) Define payment plans

Each XTRF instance has two built-in payment plans: Standard Payment and Prepayment. If you plan to receive or make payments that don't align with those two plans, you can create custom plans. To do so, perform the following steps:

Payment plans are created mostly for internal informational purposes. The actual planning of payments is made on the payment terms level.

  1. Go to the Configuration menu → System Values: Basic → Payment Plans.

  2. Click the Add button on top of the Payment Plans table. You will be directed to the Add Payment Plan page.

  3. In the Name field, provide a name for the new plan.

  4. Decide whether this plan should be Active and thus selectable.

  5. Decide whether this plan should be marked as a Preferred Item and thus appear on top of the drop-down lists.

  6. Decide whether this plan should be a Default one.

  7. Click the Save button.

Now you can use new payment plans while creating payment terms for clients and vendors.