Invoicing and Quotes in Retail: Types, Challenges, & Benefits

Retailers have more moving parts to deal with than ever before. And it’s important that all of these parts are connected, organized, and easy to manage.

Whether it’s your CRM and loyalty, your accounting, your inventory management, your supplier relations, your eCommerce, or any other aspect of your business, your point of sale serves as the center of all of these operations.

Retail invoicing and quotes are no exception. Many retailers need to provide these to customers quickly and conveniently. But what are the best ways to manage invoicing and quotes in retail and what are some simple invoicing tips? This blog explores how small businesses can easily manage their invoicing and quotes to run a smoother business.

What Is Invoice Management and Quote Generation in Retail?

Simply put, invoice management and quote generation consist of retailers creating, sending, and collecting payment for products and services provided to their customers.

This typically includes the following:

• A date of payment being due
• Generating a receipt along with the invoice
• Accepting and processing the payment
• Recording the payment in your books
• Reconciling the payment 

Running a smooth invoice management process prevents needless errors, ensures all payments are collected, and provides your customers with a seamless payment experience. And when it’s connected to your POS and inventory management, it makes running this aspect of your business even easier.

Different Types and Use Cases for Retail Invoicing

There are a surprising number of ways that retail businesses can use invoicing and quotes:

Purchase orders (PO)

POs are generated by the merchant and sent to their supplier to ask for more products to be shipped to their store. POs typically include the products, quantity, prices, desired delivery date, and item description (color, size, etc.). These can be generated by your point of sale and your inventory is automatically reconciled in the system.

Sales invoice

Some retailers will provide a sales invoice upon a customer making a purchase rather than ring up the entire sale at the checkout. This will include general product info, particularly the price, tax, payment terms, and various due dates. These are commonly used at businesses with higher ticket items.

Credit invoice

Credit invoices are generated upon a product return and replacement. These will include the amount being credited and any other details relevant to the transaction.

Pro forma invoice

For larger projects, pro forma invoices are used to send a customer an estimated cost for goods and/or services that a customer is requesting. This gives the customer an outline of the project and allows you and the customer to make amends on certain aspects of the agreement.

Recurring invoice

More and more retailers are moving to subscription-based services for their customers. In this event, it’s important to be able to send out recurring invoices at set time periods based on the agreed-upon timeline.

Notification invoices

Sometimes it’s necessary to remind customers to make a payment. A past due invoice or final invoice provides the details of the invoice along with any consequences for failure to complete the payment.

Challenges of Retail Invoicing

There are several common challenges that retailers face with invoicing and quote management:

• Too many to handle – Some retailers have dozens of invoices going out to suppliers on a daily basis. This can be difficult to handle without automation in place.
• Errors and accuracy problems – Manually creating and sending invoices easily leads to missed payments and reconciliation problems. According to Haycor, it can lead to cyber-security problems as well.
• Paper-invoicing – Relying on paper invoicing methods leads to lost documentation, missed payments, and a lack of tracking.
• Clunky payments – Old methods of invoicing lead to a lackluster customer experience and reflect poorly on your brand.

Benefits of Modern Retail Invoicing

There are several key benefits to adopting a modern invoicing system:

• Improved financial tracking – Automated invoice management gives businesses a picture of their finances in real-time to better track expenses, revenue, profitability, and cash flow. Visit this website to learn more about better financial tracking.
• Better cash flow – Better invoice management ensures more timely payments and keeps cash flow predictable and regular so that retailers have healthy funds. Automated invoicing also keeps payment terms clear and sends payment reminders when a customer forgets to complete a payment.
• Better operations – Invoice management improves overall efficiency, alleviates admin workload, helps create better budgets, and fosters better relationships with customers and suppliers.
• Fulfill multiple services – Invoices serve multiple aspects of business operations. There are multiple types of invoices to meet these needs. Choose the right type of invoice for each need.
• More flexibility for your customers – Offering a more convenient payment experience improves the overall customer experience, gaining you both new customers and turning new customers into repeat customers.
• Automate processes – Paper invoicing is notoriously difficult to manage and almost impossible to do so accurately. Digital invoicing keeps your business organized and cuts down on admin tasks.

To learn more about how KORONA POS can help with your invoicing needs and connect it to your point of sale, click below!