hi,
I’m a novice cs-cart user and I was wondering how more experienced people deal with orders which are never completed, but which generate an invoice?
for example, when a customer selects bank transfer as payment but never does the transfer, an order ( and invoice ) was generated, but we can’t put the invoice in the company books because the order was cancelled. So, we have to create a credit note for the order, and put the invoice and credit note in the company books.
however, when we do this, we will have put a useless invoice and credit note in the books which will cause extra work for our accountant (causing money to be wasted).
i have been thinking about removing the option to pay with bank transfer, such that there will be no useless invoices. however, if the paypal payment is cancelled or fails, perhaps the order itself will fail too and we will be in the same situation, with an order that didn’t go through, again requiring a credit note to cancel it out in the books.
does anyone have some good suggestions and how to handle these situations? I’m a bit clueless here
You could just delete orders that don’t go through. If you don’t want to keep a record of them. That is what I do.
first cancel the order (to replace the inventory) then delete it
at least thats what we do
[quote name=‘MikeFold’]first cancel the order (to replace the inventory) then delete it
at least thats what we do[/QUOTE]
thanks. I guess this could work, but suppose you have orders 55, 56 and 57 in the system and you want to delete order 56.
after cancelling and deleting, you now have orders 55, 57 in the system, and 56 is gone.
when you print all your invoices for the company books, invoice 56 will be missing because you deleted the order. and when the tax office comes to check your company books… they will ask where the missing invoice is ?
since tax laws differ (i understand EU can’t do it this way) maybe just leave it as cancelled so when you export it, the order shows up.
I did not read your post close enough, but you said “Failed” which would not deduct any inventory.
In the states, unless you are using the “accrual” method of accounting, the order sequence is irrelevant. All the IRS and the State care about is what amount of $$$ goes in your bank account from the cc processor (or money orders/checks). That is the number they use when audited.
[quote name=‘MikeFold’]since tax laws differ (i understand EU can’t do it this way) maybe just leave it as cancelled so when you export it, the order shows up.
I did not read your post close enough, but you said “Failed” which would not deduct any inventory.
In the states, unless you are using the “accrual” method of accounting, the order sequence is irrelevant. All the IRS and the State care about is what amount of $$$ goes in your bank account from the cc processor (or money orders/checks). That is the number they use when audited.[/QUOTE]
thanks. when the order invoice is printed, does it show the status of the order? in this case my accountant could know it was failed or cancelled and somehow handle it.
we have a double books method here… not sure what it’s called in the US.
anybody else who has some suggestions on how to handle this?
I am thinking that if I delete order 56, there might be a way to renumber all the order numbers automatically?
Only way I know of is to edit certain tables in the database manually. It’s not worth the trouble if you ask me.
i’m now looking into the possibility of adding some code myself or asking the cscart guys to develop a mod for us. however, they seem to be quite busy … so maybe I will need to do it myself.
are there any good pointers on changing cs-cart (adding some basic features is more like it) without hacking it in a dirty way… basically staying within the philosophy the developers put into the code and being consistent with the database schema…
I guess we just need a counter for invoices, which runs seperately from the order counter, and replace the print invoice button with a make invoice button that links the current invoice number to the order and uses that on the invoice, and then increases the invoice counter.
Hi All,
Is there anyone in the forum who has the skills and time to create a cs-cart addon for us? if yes please send me a private message so we can discuss the project.
Best,
Bert
Hi All,
Yes i have the same problem, I live in Italy and we must have progressive number on Invoice. Unfortunately I’m not a programmer and can’t help with mods, but I think that the real solution is that the Invoice MUST be created only when the order is SHIPPED and not when the order is places by customer, to reduce the risk maybe at the 1% of cancelled if using COD as payment method. We should find a way to divide the progressive number of ther order placed and the progressive number of the Inovice of real shipped order.
What do you think? It could be possible to do?
Regards,
Andrea.
[quote name=‘androquest’]Hi All,
Yes i have the same problem, I live in Italy and we must have progressive number on Invoice. Unfortunately I’m not a programmer and can’t help with mods, but I think that the real solution is that the Invoice MUST be created only when the order is SHIPPED and not when the order is places by customer, to reduce the risk maybe at the 1% of cancelled if using COD as payment method. We should find a way to divide the progressive number of ther order placed and the progressive number of the Inovice of real shipped order.
What do you think? It could be possible to do?
Regards,
Andrea.[/QUOTE]
hi Andrea
I have now been researching this for the past 2 weeks and it turns out there is a quickbooks export mod in the standard cs-cart installation.
this mod converts the orders to transactions for the company books, and you can import them if you use quickbooks. however, in the EU we don’t have quickbooks, I think.
so we would need to have a CSV export with similar transactions like in the quickbooks file, but it’s of course not guaranteed that accountants can import this file just like that.
what is very disappointing is that in cs-cart , when I try to export orders, I can only do this for 10 orders at a time, not all orders since date X …
so the simplest solution in my opinion would be to make a seperate php or perl script which ignores the orders which should not be converted to invoices and converts the valid orders into real invoices with sequential numbering… instead of storing the invoices into cs-cart it is easier to just fill an invoice template and store it in a directory. I don’t like this solution very much but it is probably the easiest.
has someone on the forum here already made such a script or export module for orders?
Thanks
Bert
[quote name=‘bschiett’] what is very disappointing is that in cs-cart , when I try to export orders, I can only do this for 10 orders at a time, not all orders since date X … [/QUOTE]
Something must be wrong with your software or you are exporting incorrectly.?
If you go to “Export” then “Orders” you should be able to download every order that was made. You can also choose which orders you would like to download at the bottom of the page.
[quote name=‘Tool Outfitters’]Something must be wrong with your software or you are exporting incorrectly.?
If you go to “Export” then “Orders” you should be able to download every order that was made. You can also choose which orders you would like to download at the bottom of the page.[/QUOTE]
Hi,
thanks for replying.
the installation is fine, there is nothing wrong with it.
I found the export screen now, I actually overlooked that. However, when I want to select which ones I want to download (select a range) I get the normal list of orders, in which I can only select 10 orders for export. there is also no way to get 100 orders listed on one page, for example. it’s only 10 at a time.
what I want to do, is export all orders since july 1st, 2008, for example. If the number of orders is larger than 10, I don’t know how to do this, without exporting all orders which are in the system since the very beginning.
if I exported all orders I could then import it into excel and delete the rows I don’t want or filter them in my script, but I really think this functionality should be in cs-cart.
Bert
[quote name=‘androquest’]Hi All,
Yes i have the same problem, I live in Italy and we must have progressive number on Invoice. Unfortunately I’m not a programmer and can’t help with mods, but I think that the real solution is that the Invoice MUST be created only when the order is SHIPPED and not when the order is places by customer, to reduce the risk maybe at the 1% of cancelled if using COD as payment method. We should find a way to divide the progressive number of ther order placed and the progressive number of the Inovice of real shipped order.
What do you think? It could be possible to do?
Regards,
Andrea.[/QUOTE]
Same here.
Any programmer in this forum able to create this mod urgently? If yes, please let us know the cost for it.
I am also worried about this. It is true that while in USA most people prefer paying with credit cards, in Europe this is totally different, in Spain for example, people rather pay thru money transfer (online or not) to a Spanish bank account than thru cc. They’re afraid of using their credit card numbers online. As a result, those selecting “money transfer” and then changing their minds, leave you with a cancelled order, that is, with a problem in your cs-cart numbered invoices.
I back up the idea to create invoices ONLY when the order is shipped, which means the money has been received. This will solution another problem: people buying in the store just to get invoices freely. Why would they do that? There are many reasons for such a behavior but here it is a real example. In Spain, the State gives help (money) to promote free-lancers or the creation of new companies, one of those helping measures can be for instance, financing the purchase of office equipment and/or furniture needed to start the new business. It is as simple as presenting all the invoices in the Chamber of Commerce and getting the money back into your bank account. I bet you realize the possibilities this opens. if you already have all the equipment which you bought long time ago or it costed really a bargain or you do not keep the invoices, no problem at all! Just get into a cs-cart store that sells computers, printers, fax machines, office furniture,etc and buy the most expensive items you see, select “money transfer” as form of payment and do not pay a dime, yet you’ll get plently of fresh brand new invoices to print:evil: .
[quote name=‘bschiett’]Hi,
thanks for replying.
the installation is fine, there is nothing wrong with it.
I found the export screen now, I actually overlooked that. However, when I want to select which ones I want to download (select a range) I get the normal list of orders, in which I can only select 10 orders for export. there is also no way to get 100 orders listed on one page, for example. it’s only 10 at a time.
what I want to do, is export all orders since july 1st, 2008, for example. If the number of orders is larger than 10, I don’t know how to do this, without exporting all orders which are in the system since the very beginning.
if I exported all orders I could then import it into excel and delete the rows I don’t want or filter them in my script, but I really think this functionality should be in cs-cart.
Bert[/QUOTE]
When the list of 10 comes up then select the “Range” drop down at the top of the list and select “Full list”.
[quote name=‘mirnitagl’]I am also worried about this. It is true that while in USA most people prefer paying with credit cards, in Europe this is totally different, in Spain for example, people rather pay thru money transfer (online or not) to a Spanish bank account than thru cc. They’re afraid of using their credit card numbers online. As a result, those selecting “money transfer” and then changing their minds, leave you with a cancelled order, that is, with a problem in your cs-cart numbered invoices.
I back up the idea to create invoices ONLY when the order is shipped, which means the money has been received. This will solution another problem: people buying in the store just to get invoices freely. Why would they do that? There are many reasons for such a behavior but here it is a real example. In Spain, the State gives help (money) to promote free-lancers or the creation of new companies, one of those helping measures can be for instance, financing the purchase of office equipment and/or furniture needed to start the new business. It is as simple as presenting all the invoices in the Chamber of Commerce and getting the money back into your bank account. I bet you realize the possibilities this opens. if you already have all the equipment which you bought long time ago or it costed really a bargain or you do not keep the invoices, no problem at all! Just get into a cs-cart store that sells computers, printers, fax machines, office furniture,etc and buy the most expensive items you see, select “money transfer” as form of payment and do not pay a dime, yet you’ll get plently of fresh brand new invoices to print:evil: .[/QUOTE]
I agree with mirnitagl…
however I think it’s not necessarily bad that an order is created and that a “document” is mailed to the customer, even if he didn’t pay yet. but it should be called an “order” or “order confirmation” and not “invoice” …
of course the invoice template can be changed such that it doesn’t look like an invoice anymore. so this fixes our problem …
but still, we need a way to create CREDIT NOTES and INVOICES from the orders… what will happen when a customer returns a product? we can register the return in the order, but then we have no way to print a CREDIT NOTE … we can only print invoices. quite annoying.
in fact, what happens if people buy 2 items and decide to return only one ? we need to make a credit note for one item and not for 2 items.
writing a script to export the orders and convert them into credit notes and invoices is possible, but to me it feels like a workaround and the behaviour is so essential that it should be in cs-cart.
[quote name=‘Tool Outfitters’]When the list of 10 comes up then select the “Range” drop down at the top of the list and select “Full list”.[/QUOTE]
thanks. this solves already one part of the problem but we’re still stuck with no way to create invoices and credit notes from orders without developing our own script or creating a mod in php.
[quote]this solves already one part of the problem but we’re still stuck with no way to create invoices and credit notes from orders without developing our own script or creating a mod in php.[/quote]
Even Magento, an open-source eCommerce solution has this feature by default, I think I’ll move on…