What a customer receipt changes, and where each figure comes from
This page explains the figures you look at after recording a customer payment, and what the receipt reaches beyond the invoice it settles. Read it with Steps 5 to 7 open.
What each figure is, and when it moves
Most of the questions that follow a receipt are “this number is wrong”. Usually the number is right and it is a different number from the one you meant. Here is where each figure you will look at comes from, using the RM 42,468 payment for SI-00019.
| The figure | Where it comes from | When it moves |
|---|---|---|
| The invoice’s Doc Open Amount (its ARAP tab) | The invoice’s own lines: what it charged, less anything collected on the invoice itself. Recalculated from those lines when the invoice is saved | Never, because of a receipt. It reads RM 42,468.00 before and after |
| The invoice’s Contra and Outstanding | Contra is recomputed from every contra row the invoice takes part in, added up again from scratch. Outstanding is Doc Open plus Contra. The second request in Step 7 writes both at once | When the contra request returns: Contra −RM 42,468.00, Outstanding RM 0.00 |
| The receipt’s own balance | The money on its settlement lines, carried with the opposite sign to an invoice; its contra rows carry the opposite sign again | It rises to zero as you apply it. Anything left is the unapplied amount, listed on the Outstanding Document Report as a negative balance |
| The cashbook line | Written by the cashbook job a moment after FINAL, one per settlement line: the settlement amount less the method’s own charges, dated with the receipt’s transaction date, carrying the settlement line’s reference | Rewritten by Settlement Adjustment, removed by VOID |
| The journal | Written by the journal job a moment after FINAL, dated with the receipt’s transaction date | Reversed by VOID; a contra never touches it |
| Ageing and statements “as of today” | A live figure, read from each document’s own balance when you run the report | At once |
| Ageing for a month that has ended | A stored snapshot, taken at 01:00 on the first of the following month | A contra reworks it, counting the payment only in month-ends on or after the Contra Date (Step 6) |
| A Statement of Account you have already produced | Read from the finalised records when that statement line was rendered; the PDF is kept and re-sent as it was | A new statement run picks the receipt up; an old one keeps the old balance |
| The customer’s available credit | A live figure: the balances of every FINAL document for this customer in this company, added together, against the limit | When the receipt is finalised, not when it is applied. An unapplied receipt already counts against what they owe, and a contra lowers the invoice and raises the receipt by the same RM 42,468, so it changes nothing |
Two consequences are worth carrying away. If you are waiting for the Doc Open Amount to fall, it stays put, and nothing is wrong. And a customer who has paid but whose receipt is still a draft has paid nothing as far as their credit is concerned, whatever the invoice says.
That last case is a trap of its own. Saving a draft receipt with invoices ticked on its Contra tab sends the contra request too, so SI-00019 reads as paid while the receipt has no journal, no cashbook line, and does not yet count against the customer’s balance. Do not leave a receipt in draft with a contra on it overnight.
What this receipt touches elsewhere
Before you can record the receipt, three things must exist: the FINAL invoice in the same company, the customer it was raised for, and a settlement method mapped to a cashbook with a GL code in the Cashbook applet. A gap in the last one is the failure Step 7 describes.
Once it is finalised and applied, this is what it changes, and where you will see it:
- Bank reconciliation. The cashbook line is what the Bank Reconciliation applet matches against your primary bank’s statement. It carries what landed (RM 42,456), the receipt’s transaction date and the settlement line’s reference, which is why Step 2 and Step 4 are worth getting right. Whoever reconciles the bank at month-end is the person who finds a wrong date or a double-counted charge, usually weeks later; keying from the statement in front of you is how you spare them.
- Ageing and the Outstanding Document Report. In the Debtor Report applet,
SI-00019leaves the outstanding list once its Outstanding is zero, and a fully applied receipt leaves it too. A receipt with money still unapplied stays as its own row with a negative balance. - Statement of Account. The Statement of Account applet shows the payment the next time a statement is produced.
- The customer’s credit. Finalising the receipt frees RM 42,468 of headroom against their limit at once, which matters if a sales order is waiting on it; deciding on credit explains which available-credit figure the FINAL check reads.
- E-invoicing: nothing. A receipt keyed here is not an e-invoice document type, so finalising or voiding it sends nothing to LHDN (the Malaysian tax authority) and changes no e-invoice. Any e-invoice for this sale is
SI-00019’s, and being paid does not alter it.
The blast radius of applying it to the wrong invoice. Apply the RM 42,468 to SI-00018 instead of SI-00019 and the ledger is untouched: the receipt credited the customer’s receivable when it was finalised, whichever invoice it later settles. What goes wrong is everything that reads the per-invoice balance. SI-00019 stays overdue in the ageing, the next statement asks the customer for money they have paid, and the credit controller chases the wrong document. The customer’s total is right throughout, which is why nobody notices from the total. Across the group the risk is different: the Contra tab never offers a GSO invoice to a GS receipt at all, so a payment keyed in the wrong company shows up as an unapplied GS receipt beside an overdue GSO invoice. Money one company collects for another is a group accounting decision, not a contra; take it to whoever keeps the intercompany accounts rather than forcing it through.
What it usually pairs with. In practice a receipt is keyed alongside the bank statement it came from, and checked the same week against the Outstanding Document Report: the person keying receipts clears what they can on the day, and the credit controller works through the negative-balance rows that are left before the next collections round.
Related documentation
- Recording a Customer Payment: the task, with its success check and the common mistakes.
- Debtor Report and Statement of Account: where the receivable figures are read back.
- Bank Reconciliation: what matches the cashbook line.