Quotation charge lines
Expenses → Quotation charge lines lists charge lines from quotations that are waiting to be costed — work you have billed or will bill, where the corresponding supplier cost has not yet been recorded.
It is a working list, not a report. Every line on it represents a job whose true margin is not yet known.
Why it matters
When you quote, you record what you expect to charge and what you expect to pay. The charge side becomes an invoice quickly. The cost side waits for the supplier's invoice, which can be weeks.
In that gap, the job looks more profitable than it is. This screen is the list of jobs in that state, and working it is what keeps reported margin honest.
Working the list
For each line, one of three things is true:
- The supplier has invoiced — record it as a vendor invoice, allocated to the shipment. See Vendor invoices.
- The cost was paid in cash by a representative — it belongs to a custody reconciliation. See Custody payment requests.
- The cost is not going to arise — the line was quoted but the service was not used. It should be resolved rather than left.
Lines left on this list indefinitely are the ones that eventually surface as an unexpected supplier invoice for a job closed months ago.
A charge line can only be claimed once
Each charge line is claimed by one vendor invoice expense line. That is why a second invoice for the same shipment and charge code is refused — the line is already taken. It is also why this list shrinks as costs come in: a claimed line leaves it.
Publishing accruals
Where cost is expected but not yet invoiced, it can be accrued. Two constraints apply:
- A revenue invoice must exist first — "No revenue invoice published for shipment: …". Accrual matches cost against billed revenue, so the revenue side has to be there.
- LCL shipments are not supported — "LCL shipments are not supported for accrual publishing". Groupage cost has to arrive as an actual vendor invoice.
A third message, "Missing billing info for shipment(s)", means the shipment lacks the billing data the accrual needs. Complete the shipment rather than forcing the accrual.
Before closing a period
Clear this list, or knowingly accrue what remains. Whatever is outstanding when a month closes is cost recognised in the wrong period.
Closed periods
Expenses → Closed periods locks an accounting period once its work is finished.
A closed period records:
| Field | Notes |
|---|---|
| Year and Month | Which period. |
| Closed by | Who closed it. |
| Closed at | When. |
What closing means
Closing a period prevents further postings into it. That is the point: once a month has been reported, the numbers must not move, or every report produced from them becomes provisional.
Closing a month closes everything before it too. A vendor invoice is rejected when its date "falls within or before a closed accounting period". So closing March also blocks a late invoice dated February, even if February was never explicitly closed. This is usually what you want — but it means closing a month out of sequence has wider effect than it appears.
Closing a period that is already closed is refused ("Period …/… is already closed"), as is reopening one that is not closed. Both are guards against a double action rather than problems to solve.
Before you close
- Vendor invoices for the period are entered — including those that arrived after month end but relate to it.
- Quotation charge lines for the period are resolved or accrued.
- Custody requests are reconciled.
- Invoices are issued for work completed in the period.
Closing early is the more common mistake. A period closed with costs still to come pushes them into the next month, where they distort a month they do not belong to — and the distortion is invisible unless someone remembers.
Reopening
Reopening a closed period is an exceptional act, not a routine correction. If something was missed, the normal answer is to post it in the current period and note why. Reopening changes numbers that have already been reported, and anyone who relied on them will not know.
Who should close
One person, on a defined date, with the checklist above. A period closed by whoever happened to be looking at the screen is a period nobody has actually checked.
Last updated 9 September 2026