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Creating Cost-Plus Client Invoices

This article walks through creating a client invoice for a Cost-Plus job.

Overview

  • There is no locked contract total. Instead, invoices are generated based on the actual paid supplier and subcontractor bills, plus timesheet costs that have hit the job. You can lock your estimate but easily unlock to make changes.

  • A markup percentage can be set on the job and applied automatically to each bill and timesheet amount being charged to the client.

  • You can attach the bill or timesheet PDF to the client invoice so the client can see exactly what they're being charged for and why.

  • A Cost Plus job can be created even without a completed estimate- the budget will just start with no costings.

Create an Invoice

  1. Navigate to Jobs > select the relevant Job > Job Financials > Client Invoices, then click +Invoice or +Deposit in the top right-hand corner of the screen.

  2. Optionally, set the issue date by clicking the icon next to Schedule Send. You can set the invoice trigger to a specific date, or to the start/end date of a schedule item. The due date is calculated automatically from your company-wide default payment terms. To change it manually, click the icon next to Due Date.

  3. Add in your items to the invoice:

  • Bill costs- click

    💡Tip: If a bill isn't showing up in the list, check that it's set to status Paid or Approved for Payment. Under Job Financials > Bills look to the status column on the right side.

  • Timesheet entries- click and select the individual entries to include, then close the pop-up.

  • You can also add catalog items or custom line items. For custom items edit the description and markup for full flexibility over what appears on the invoice.

Preview the invoice line by line, then click Save and Send. This opens the Invoice Formatting drawer, where you can control how timesheets, bills, and other items are grouped and displayed on the client-facing PDF before it goes out — see Customize Your Invoice Layout below.

Choose Save Draft or Save and Schedule to queue up your invoice for future processing to your accounting software.

⚠️ A pop-up will give you the option to send a PDF copy directly to the customer. To avoid sending duplicate invoices, we recommend sending only from your accounting software.

Customize Your Invoice Layout

When you click Save and Send, a formatting drawer opens with options for how each cost type appears on the client PDF. Changes update the PDF preview live as you adjust them.

Timesheets

  • Choose how timesheets are grouped: Individual Entries (a flat list of every entry), by Week, by Month, by Cost Group, or by Cost Code.

  • When grouped, you can also choose to break each group down further into individual entries — each line then shows the employee, cost code, date and hours worked, with an optional link back to the original timesheet.

Bills

  • Choose how bills are grouped: by Cost Group, by Cost Code then Supplier, or by Week. As an example.

  • Grouping by Cost Code then Supplier lists each cost code with the supplier name and bills underneath it.

Other Items

  • Catalog items and custom items can be shown individually or combined into a single line item on the invoice.

Display options

  • Show subgroup totals — adds a subtotal line under each group.

  • Show start/end times — displays start and end times on timesheet entries.

  • Show builder's markup — when enabled, markup shows as its own line item per entry. When disabled, markup is folded into each line item's total and shown instead as a single combined markup line at the bottom of the invoice.

Sending options

  • Choose whether to send this invoice to your accounting software or issue it without syncing.

  • Choose whether to email the client a copy via the checkbox in the same drawer.

💡 Tip: If you will reuse this format in the future tick the 'Make this the default for new cost plus invoices' option in the bottom left corner. To save you time on customizing in the future.

Deposit Invoices

To create a Deposit Invoice, Navigate to Job Financials > Client Invoices and choose.

The deposit invoice sits in addition to the contract or job total, it's not a claim against progress. So it's important to apply the deposit as a credit against a later progress claim invoice, otherwise your job totals will overstate what's actually owed.

To apply a Deposit Invoice look to the Deposits area of your draft client invoice and choose to open the side menu. Choose the deposit by check marking. Then enter in the percentage to be claimed.

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