Invoicing a client in another country

An invoice is a document two people rely on. Most of the friction in getting paid across a border comes from that document being vague.

Settle how you get paid before you invoice

Add a payment method first. It can be a payment link, a bank account or a provider account, and the invoice takes a snapshot of it when you send. That matters: if you change your bank details next month, the invoice your client is about to pay still shows the details it was sent with. A document that changes under its reader is not a document.

What the invoice carries

• A number, assigned when you send it. Drafts have no number.
• The date it was issued and the date it is due.
• One line per thing you are billing for.
• The currency you agreed, and only that currency.
• Your billing details and theirs, both snapshotted at send.

If you agreed a currency other than pesos, the invoice is in that currency and carries a courtesy conversion. The rate is frozen at the moment you send, so the total cannot move afterwards.

Numbers are gapless on purpose

Your numbers run in an unbroken sequence. A cancelled invoice keeps its number rather than freeing it up, because a sequence with a hole in it is the first thing an accountant asks about. You can set a number by hand on a draft, and once an invoice is sent its number is frozen.

Bill from approved hours

If you have been logging hours, an invoice can be built from an approved week: one line per worked day, with every time entry linked to it. An entry that has already been billed cannot be billed again. That is a database constraint rather than a habit, so double-billing is not something you have to remember not to do.

Chasing it

If an invoice goes past its due date, reminders go out on a widening schedule and the last one says it is the last. You can also send one yourself. Either way your client sees a record of when they were reminded, and so do you.

What we are not

We do not take the payment, hold it, or guarantee it. The invoice is a document and the payment is between the two of you. That is the same reason nobody takes a cut of it.

Your invoices are here.