What Are Subsidiaries?
In Productive, a subsidiary represents your company or one of its entities. Each subsidiary holds the legal and financial details that appear on documents you issue to clients:
Invoices (Bill From section)
Proposals
Budgets
Purchase orders
If your organization has only one entity, it will appear under Settings > Company Info > Subsidiaries. If you operate multiple entities, you can add each as a subsidiary and select the correct one when issuing invoices or creating documents.
Setting up multiple subsidiaries is available on the Ultimate subscription plan.
Adding or Editing a Subsidiary
To add or edit a subsidiary:
1) Go to Settings > Company info.
2) Select Add subsidiary (or edit an existing one).
3) Fill in the following details:
Logo
Appears on invoices, proposals, budgets, and purchase orders issued by this subsidiary.Full Company Name
This information is shown in the Bill From section on invoices.Tax ID
Displayed on invoices.
👉 Find out more about TAX IDs here.Address Details
Displayed on invoices in the Bill From section. Includes Street, City, ZIP/Postcode, State, Country.
4) Default Financial Settings
Default Tax Rate
Automatically assigned based on the country when you create the subsidiary. Pre-fills invoices, budgets, deals, and expenses if no client-specific tax is set. After saving, new tax rates can be created and selected, or the default can be edited in Settings > Company Info > Tax Rates.Default Bank Account
Populates the Pay To section on all invoices issued by this subsidiary. Used for e-invoicing and XML invoice formats. Ensure the bank account exists before selecting it.Default Invoice Template
Select one of your existing invoice templates to use automatically when creating invoices for this subsidiary. If a client-level template is set, that one takes priority. If neither is set, Productive uses the first template in alphabetical order.
About defaults
When creating invoices, Productive applies a hierarchy to decide which template and subsidiary details are used.
📌 Template selection hierarchy
Client company default invoice template (set in CRM > Companies)
Subsidiary default invoice template (set here)
First template in the list (alphabetical order)
📌 Subsidiary selection hierarchy
Client company default subsidiary (set in CRM > Companies)
If none is set, the subsidiary from the budget being invoiced
If invoicing multiple budgets with different subsidiaries, Productive assigns the Bill from field to the first subsidiary in alphabetical order
Using Subsidiaries in Invoices, Budgets, and Deals
Subsidiary details are used across Productive to ensure documents display the correct legal, financial, and branding information:
Invoices
Bill From section: Full company name, tax ID, and address.
Pay To section: Bank account linked to the subsidiary.
Tax Rate: Pre-filled if no client-specific tax is set.
Budgets and Deals
Assign the budget or deal to a specific subsidiary.
Default tax rate pre-fills the tax field if no client-specific tax is defined.
PDFs (invoices, proposals, budgets, and purchase orders) → The subsidiary logo and details display on the document.
Expenses → Subsidiary tax rates are available when submitting expenses, as long as the expense is tied to the correct budget and subsidiary.
E-invoicing → Default bank accounts linked to subsidiaries are included in XML invoice formats.
📌 Tip: When creating an invoice draft, choose the correct active subsidiary. Any subsidiary-based document templates you previously created (see below) will also be available, ensuring invoices reflect the correct subsidiary details.
Tip: Create Subsidiary-Based Document Templates
By default, document templates are not tied to subsidiaries. But if you create a document template for a specific subsidiary, it will be available when issuing an invoice for that entity. This ensures that your invoice, proposal, or budget reflects the correct subsidiary details automatically.
📌 Note: The document style controls the visual appearance of the final PDF like fonts, colors, headers/footers, and logo placement. You can combine any style with your template to customize how the document looks.
To create subsidiary-based templates:
Go to Settings > Document templates
Click on "Add document template"
Name your template clearly, e.g., “NY Branch Invoice,” so it’s easy to select when issuing documents for that subsidiary
Select a document style to control the final PDF appearance
Customize the template by adjusting sections, fields, and layout to match your subsidiary’s branding and requirements.
The subsidiary information, such as the logo, name, and address, will be displayed above the document preview so you can immediately see how the final document will appear for that subsidiary.
📌 These subsidiary-based templates will appear when issuing invoices, proposals, or budgets for that entity, ensuring all documents reflect the correct details.
