Accounts payable settings

What this does

Three settings shape how bills behave. They live on the AP settings page at /accounting/payables/settings under your shop's address; there is no menu link to it yet, so bookmark it.

Before you start

accounting.manage. Set these before entering the first bill; the defaults are used the moment a bill is saved.

Settings

Approval Workflow. Require bill approval on means a new bill saves as Pending approval and can't be paid until an Owner or General Manager approves it from the bill page. Off, every saved bill is approved immediately. Turn it on when the person entering bills isn't the person who decides what gets paid.

Bill Numbering. Bill Prefix and Next Bill Number control the app's own number on each bill (BILL-000123, say). The number is claimed atomically when the bill is created, so two people entering bills at once never collide. This is the app's number; the vendor's invoice number goes in Vendor Invoice # (Ref) on the bill.

Default Accounts. Default AP Account (Liability) is where every bill's payable is credited and every payment is debited, normally 2000 Accounts Payable. Default Expense Account pre-fills the bill form. Default Payment Account (Asset) pre-fills the pay-from account on payments.

What happens in the books

The AP account you set here is the one every accrual and payment uses. Changing it later affects new bills only; old ones stay on the account they were posted to, so your AP balance would be split across two accounts. Pick it once.

Common problems

Bills are posting to the wrong liability account. The default AP account was changed, or the setting is blank and the app fell back to account 2000. Set it, and correct old entries with a journal entry.

A bill skipped approval. It was saved before approval was turned on, or by an Owner using Approve & Save. The switch applies to bills created after it's on.