Instead of creating a separate proposal and invoice, you can enable your clients to pay their deposit directly on a TravelJoy smart proposal and have the invoice created automatically. In this guide, we assume that you have direct payments enabled and you've already learned the basics of building a smart proposal.
Enabling client payments on your smart proposal
By default, you will see an option to enable client payments at the top-right corner of your proposal, along with a deposit and total price field which remain visible as long as the client payment feature is off:
Move the slider to the right to enable client payments and you'll see a new set of options:
(Note: For members using Legacy Direct Payments, this feature utilizes our Funds platform. If Funds is not already enabled for your trip or group, you will be prompted to enable this feature before processing the authorization. You can learn more about Funds in our FAQ.)
Add pricing (and markup) to the items in your proposal
Now that you've enabled client payments, you'll need to add your cost for each item using the "Supplier cost" field, just below the photo upload box.
Keep in mind that your cost refers to how much you'll need to collect to pay suppliers, and this will not be visible to clients by default.
Once you've added the cost, you can choose whether you'd like to add your own (invisible) markup to that item's overall price. If you'll be selling at cost, you can leave this option turned off. Otherwise, move the slider to the right:
The markup settings area allows you to manually enter a markup amount or use the slider to easily model different markup percentages.
Configuring client payment settings
Once your items are added, you can go back to the smart proposal settings and click the blue pencil icon at the top-right corner of the gray box to edit the client payment settings. In the image below, the blue pencil icon is just below the "YES" button, and has already been clicked:
The following settings can be customized in this area:
- Payment schedule: Determines whether you require a deposit or payment in full. For "Deposit and final payment," you'll be able to choose the deposit amount and final payment due date.
- Terms and conditions: Determines which terms your client must agree to during checkout
- Charge convenience fee: Determines whether client will pay a convenience fee
- Show client itemized prices: Check this box if you'd like to enable the client to see their individual item pricing. By default, the client will only see the total price.
Final notes
Once you've added your items and markups and updated your client payment settings, send the proposal as normal. Your client will be prompted to pay upon approval and an invoice will automatically be generated in the trip's Files tab upon payment.
Comments
7 comments
Once a client pays their deposit on a Smart Proposal invoice, can their invoice be updated with a monthly payment schedule that can also be automated?
Hi Richard!Â
Great question. You can update invoices and payment schedules after a payment has been made. This guide goes over how to do that in detail: Update an invoice after it has been sent
That said, any auto-pay options will need to be re-accepted by your clients. You can learn more about auto-pay here: Auto-pay FAQ
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Does this feature allow for the invoice created to be a Supplier Invoice as oppose to a Direct Invoice? Â I just want to collect the payment info from my client without the charge on their card and the money going into my business bank account.Â
Hi Tanisha Burke! Currently, there is not a way to create a Supplier invoice from a Smart Proposal. That said, I can see how this would be beneficial. I've added this to our feature request list, and shared with our team!Â
Tanisha Burke that is definitely what's needed on the supplier side. Once a proposal is approved it should automatically turn into an invoice, just as it does for the itinerary.Â
Hi! I wanted to follow up on Tanisha Burke's request for a supplier invoice direct from the proposal. This would be greatly beneficial because in most cases we are not using direct fund to pay for trip items. Is there an update on this feature becoming available?
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Chiming in, as well. 99% of all bookings are Supplier Invoices. It's a best practice that we don't accept money in-house. We just pay the suppliers directly.Â
Adding the supplier invoice feature here should be an "easy" addition to smart proposals, although it's been over a year since it was first suggested in this thread. We shouldn't have to recreate the wheel with creating a new invoice and it would streamline the deposit process by eliminating an extra step for our clients.
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