Understanding Deposits and Amount Due

A deposit is money you ask for when a customer accepts a quote. Cooledge works the amount out from your payment terms, collects or records it and carves it out of the job's invoice.

• The deposit percentage comes from Settings > Quote Preferences > Payment Terms, per work type and client type
• Set the Deposit % to 0 and the customer just accepts. No payment step, no deposit invoice
• A card deposit is real money the moment it is paid. Choosing EFT, cash or a custom option only tells you how they intend to pay
• You can create the job before the money arrives. The deposit invoice is created as a Draft you can send as the request
• Receive Deposit records money that arrived by hand, including part payments
• Every succeeded payment can produce a branded receipt PDF

Where the Deposit Amount Comes From

You do not type a deposit amount on each quote. Cooledge works it out from your payment terms.

1. Go to Settings and open Quote Preferences
2. Open the Payment Terms tab
3. Pick the work type and the client type (Standard, Real Estate or Construction)
4. Set the Deposit %

The deposit is that percentage of the accepted total, including GST. A $2,200 quote on 10% terms asks for $220.

Because the percentage is set per work type and client type, a repair quote and an install quote can ask for different deposits, and a real estate client can be treated differently to a homeowner. See Quote Preferences for the full settings tour.

The terms text is separate. The Terms box beside the Deposit % is free text that prints on the quote. Changing the percentage does not change that wording, so if you move to 0% you have to edit the text as well, or the quote will still say "10% deposit on acceptance of quote".

Quotes With No Deposit

Set the Deposit % to 0 and the quote asks for nothing up front. The helper text under the field says so:

Set 0 for no deposit. The customer accepts the quote without paying.

A blank field is not the same thing. Leave it empty and you get the validation error Enter a deposit percentage, and the Save button stays disabled until you fix it.

What the customer sees on a 0% quote: the accept page reads Confirm your acceptance below, with a One last step panel saying that accepting confirms their order and you will be in touch to arrange the next steps. There is one button, Confirm acceptance. No payment method picker, no card form.

Once they confirm, the quote goes straight to Paid and the banner on the quote page reads "Quote accepted. Your Business will be in touch."

No deposit invoice is created, and the job's invoice carries the full total. These quotes never appear in Awaiting Payment on your dashboard, because there is nothing to wait for.

0% does not mean you cannot take a deposit. It means Cooledge is not collecting one for you, and it will not offer you a Receive Deposit action on that quote. If you arrange deposits yourself, by phone or on site, record the money as a payment on the job's invoice instead.

How the Customer Pays

On the accept page the customer picks from the methods you have configured under Settings > Quote Preferences > Deposit Payment Methods: card (when Stripe is connected), bank transfer, cash and any custom options you added.

By Card

The card path takes the money there and then through Stripe. The payment is verified, recorded against the quote and the quote flips to Paid immediately. Stripe emails the customer its own receipt for the charge.

By EFT, Cash or a Custom Option

Choosing one of these tells you how they intend to pay. It does not record a payment, because no money has moved.

The customer sees Almost done, with the amount and your instructions for that method:

Please pay $220.00 using the details below. We'll confirm once your payment is received.

The quote stays Accepted with the deposit pending until you record the money.

Emailing Your Payment Details

Under the payment terms in Settings > Quote Preferences > Payment Terms there is a toggle, Email deposit details to customers. Turn it on and a customer who chooses transfer or cash also gets your payment details by email, so the bank account is in their inbox rather than on a page they have already closed.

The subject line is your business name followed by "deposit details for" and the quote reference. The body carries the amount, the instructions text you saved for that method, a View your quote button and your email signature. Replies go to your business email.

It is sent once per real change of method, and it is skipped when the quote has no customer email address or you have not written any instructions for that method. Only the business owner can change the toggle, and it saves the moment you flip it.

What You See When a Customer Accepts

A push notification. For a manual method the title is "💵 Deposit method chosen", and the body names the customer, the amount, the quote and the method they picked, ending "No payment recorded yet." For a card deposit you get the quote-paid push instead, and for a 0% quote the title is "✅ No deposit required".

An email to your business. The selection email is titled "Deposit Method Selected" and says the customer has chosen their method and that no payment has been recorded yet. A second email follows later, when the money is actually received.

A panel on the quote. An accepted quote with a deposit still owing shows an Awaiting Deposit Payment panel, with Receive Deposit as the green primary action and Create / Link Job beside it.

The panel names the full deposit figure. It does not subtract part payments, so check the Receive Deposit modal for what is actually still owing.

Recording the Money: Receive Deposit

When the transfer lands or the cash arrives, open the quote and click Receive Deposit.

1. Deposit Amount defaults to what is still owing
2. Payment Method is EFT / Bank Transfer, Cash or Credit Card (Manual Entry)
3. Add a Reference Number and Notes if they help
4. Click Record Deposit

Part payments accumulate. Record half a deposit and the quote stays Accepted with the deposit pending. Reopen the modal and it shows the expected deposit, then a line reading how much has been received so far and how much is still owing, with the amount prefilled to the balance.

You cannot receive more than is owing. Try and you get "That is more than the deposit still owing on this quote." To collect more than the deposit, invoice for it instead.

The quote flips to Paid only when the deposit is fully covered. At that point you get the deposit received email and a "💰 Deposit Received" push, and if the job was created from a Quote Visit, the "Pending Quote" hold on that job is released.

Other Ways the Money Can Land

Receive Deposit is not the only path. Once a deposit invoice exists, the quote also flips to Paid when the deposit invoice is fully paid by any of these:

• Record Payment on the deposit invoice
• Take Payment by card on the deposit invoice
• The customer paying the Stripe link on a sent deposit invoice
• A payment imported from Xero or QuickBooks that settles it

Creating the Job Before the Deposit Arrives

You do not have to wait for the money. On an accepted quote, Create / Link Job is available beside Receive Deposit.

Cooledge warns you first. The No Deposit Received dialog offers three choices: Receive Deposit (record the money now, then continue), Create job anyway / Link job anyway, then Cancel. The dialog spells out the consequence:

The deposit hasn't been received. The deposit invoice will be created as a draft you can send to the customer.

The confirmation that follows says the same thing again, listing "Create a draft deposit invoice and deduct it from the base invoice".

Choose to continue and the job is created with two invoices:

• The base invoice, numbered after the job, carrying the work
• A deposit invoice, numbered job + "-2", carrying the deposit

The deposit invoice is created as a Draft, which means you can open it, send it to the customer and let them pay it as the deposit request. Any deposit money already recorded on the quote is attached to it, so nothing is lost.

On the job's Billing tab a Draft invoice that has never been sent carries the chip Unsent. The invoices list and the invoice page call the same thing Draft.

How the Deposit Shows on the Invoices

Open the job and go to the Billing tab. You will see the base invoice and, under Partial Invoices, the deposit invoice.

The deposit is not a total on the base invoice. It is a negative line item on it, one per line of the deposit invoice, named after the deposit invoice and the quote:

Partial Invoice #1050-2 (Quote Q-AB-12345/1 Deposit)

Its amount is the deposit, negative.

So a $2,200 job with a $220 deposit reads:

The two add up to the $2,200 the customer agreed to, and the customer is never asked for the same money twice. The negative line carries the same GST rate as the deposit line it mirrors, so your tax stays right in Cooledge and in your accounting software.

Amount Due on any invoice is its total less the payments recorded against it. The deposit invoice shows Paid once the deposit money is on it; the base shows what is left to collect when the work is done.

Receipts

Every succeeded payment that has not been reversed can produce a receipt.

• Download receipt (PDF) generates a branded, themed receipt: your business name and ABN, the customer, the invoice or quote it applies to, the amount, the method, the date received and the reference
• View card receipt (Stripe) opens Stripe's own hosted receipt for a card charge

The receipt says plainly what it is:

This is a receipt, not a tax invoice. It confirms that Your Business received the payment shown above. Your tax invoice is issued separately.

Both actions live on the row menu on the Payments page, on an invoice's payment history and on a customer's Payments tab. A manually recorded payment offers only the PDF. A reversed payment offers neither. Stripe receipt links are captured at the moment a card payment is recorded, so older card payments taken before this feature shipped do not have one.

If You Use ServiceM8

ServiceM8-mode businesses do not get Cooledge jobs or invoices from quotes, so there is no deposit invoice. The quote-level Receive Deposit flow is how you record the money, and the receipt PDF is your document for it.

What reaches ServiceM8:

• When the customer chooses EFT, cash or a custom option, the ServiceM8 job is created or updated straight away with the quote's items, completed works and PDFs. No deposit line is pushed
• When you receive the deposit in full, a single negative Quote {reference} Deposit Applied line is pushed to that job
• The card path is unchanged: the job and the deposit line go across together
• A 0% quote never gets a deposit line

If a push fails, the quote shows an error in its ServiceM8 Job Sync panel and the Retry SM8 Sync action repairs it. See ServiceM8 Integration.

On the Mobile App

The Cooledge app can receive a deposit. Open the quote and use Receive Deposit exactly as you would in the portal, including part payments and the same cap on the amount.

Two differences worth knowing:

• The mobile modal shows the expected deposit but not the running "received so far" figure, and it prefills the full deposit even after a part payment. Correct the amount before you save it
• There is no Create / Link Job action on a quote in the app and no receipt PDF download. Card payments show a View receipt link to Stripe's hosted receipt on the invoice payments list

Common Questions

Can I change the deposit amount on a single quote? Not directly. The amount comes from the payment terms in force when the customer accepts. If a job needs a different deposit, change the percentage for that work type or client type before you send the quote.

Can I collect more than the deposit up front? No. Receive Deposit caps at what is still owing, and the accept page charges the deposit figure and nothing else. Invoice for anything extra.

The customer paid half by transfer and wants to put the rest on a card. Can they? Not on the accept page. Once any part of a deposit has been received, the accept page tells them "Part of this deposit has already been received. Please contact us to arrange the rest." Take the balance yourself through Receive Deposit, or take the card payment on the deposit invoice.

Do customers get an email when I record their deposit? No. The received notification goes to your business. Send them the receipt PDF if you want to confirm it, or send them the deposit invoice.

Can I reverse a deposit payment? A deposit sitting on a deposit invoice can be reversed from the row menu, like any invoice payment. A deposit recorded against a quote that has no deposit invoice yet cannot. Either way, reversing does not move the quote back off Paid, so correct the quote by hand if the money really went away.

Why is my deposit not showing as a deduction on the invoice? Look for the negative Partial Invoice #... line on the base invoice rather than a "deposit" total. If there is no deposit invoice at all, the quote either had no deposit or was not the quote the job was created from.

Does the deposit affect my revenue reporting? The money counts when it is received. The deposit invoice and the negative line on the base are there so the same money is only billed once.

Related Articles

• Quote Preferences - Setting your deposit percentage and payment methods
• Creating Invoices - How job invoices are built
• Sending Invoices - Getting paid on the balance
• Managing Payments - Finding, reversing and receipting payments
• Understanding Invoice Numbers - How the -2 suffix works