Invoicing in STRATAFOLIO

Benefits of Invoicing with STRATAFOLIO

Why should you use STRATAFOLIO for invoicing? With STRATAFOLIO, invoicing is simple and streamlined.

1. Automatically Capture Rent Escalations – STRATAFOLIO automatically includes the correct lease escalations and operating expense amounts on all the invoices generated through the application. This means you can consistently bill your tenants in accordance with the lease obligations without creating cumbersome spreadsheets and calendar reminders.
2. Bulk Invoice Across All QuickBooks Company Accounts – Since STRATAFOLIO integrates all your QuickBooks accounts together in the Rent Collection section, bulk invoicing allows you to add invoices across all your QuickBooks accounts with just a couple of clicks. 
3. Syncs with QuickBooks – Our bi-directional integration with QuickBooks ensures that STRATAFOLIO also automatically adds invoices to your QuickBooks account within minutes.
4. Receive Payments in STRATAFOLIO – Since all your tenants appear on the Rent Collection page of STRATAFOLIO, regardless of their QuickBooks accounts, adding payments is quick and easy. Once you apply a payment to a tenant’s invoice in STRATAFOLIO, STRATAFOLIO also applies it to your QuickBooks account within minutes. This process eliminates the need for double data entry.
5. Receive Payments with ACH – Receive Payments with ACH – Tired of tracking late payments? With the ACH option in STRATAFOLIO, tenants can set up automatic payments, so their payments are never late again. Your tenants can also make a one-time payment via the STRATAFOLIO ACH for late fees.
6. The graphic below shows how creating invoices in STRATAFOLIO compares to handling the same process directly in QuickBooks. Because STRATAFOLIO pulls rent rates and escalations directly from each lease schedule, STRATAFOLIO generates your invoices with the correct amounts across all your linked QuickBooks company files in just a few clicks, without building and maintaining a separate recurring invoice in each account.

Invoicing Tips & Tricks

Invoice Number

The Rent Collection page displays Invoice Numbers to make it easy to see the status of each invoice.

The green invoices with a number indicate that the invoice is complete. The number is the QuickBooks account number, and the $0.00 in the Balance column indicates that the invoice has been recorded as paid in QuickBooks.

You may have sent two invoices with the same due date. In these cases, check if it’s a duplicate if the Invoiced Amount is twice the usual monthly amount. However, two invoices in one month could be correct if you billed the tenant separately for a special charge.

When you first add an invoice in STRATAFOLIO, it will be given an “SF” number. The next time STRATAFOLIO syncs with QuickBooks, the number will update to the QuickBooks-assigned invoice number, and “SF” will be replaced with the QuickBooks-generated number.

The red status on invoices indicates that an invoice has not been finalized. In this case, the invoice has been added and saved as a “Draft.” It has an “SF” number because the invoice has not been synced with QuickBooks and can not until it is finalized.

NOTE: After syncing with QuickBooks, if the invoice is not given a number from QuickBooks, for example, if is what appears (the number is missing), contact STRATAFOLIO support for more help, as your QuickBooks settings may be affecting the functionality of our software. This link to the QuickBooks Community forum provides more information.

Tenant Must Be Associated With An Accounting Software Customer

On the Rent Collection page, if there is a red triangle next to the tenant’s name in the invoices column, hover over the triangle for more information. Generally, it is a warning indicating your tenant is not set up for invoicing.

The Accounting Software Customer must first be entered into QuickBooks as a Customer. Then, in STRATAFOLIO, you will select this customer under the Lease information to link the two together.

To do this, start by navigating to the Lease from the Leases index page under Operations in the left-side navigation menu. Click on the pencil icon to edit the Lease information.

Once in the Edit Lease pop-up window, select the Accounting Software Customer from the dropdown options about halfway down the page. You can also select Print or Email under Invoice Preferences in this window.

How to Print or Preview Invoices

The Print or Preview Invoices button in the Rent Collection page allows you to select the invoice(s) to download and print. When you select this button, you will be prompted to set the filter criteria for the invoices you want to print. Selecting Print Invoices will download a PDF file to your computer. The invoices added in STRATAFOLIO are already formatted for mailing to tenants if you choose to print and mail them. This also allows you to save all of the invoices in one file or separately, depending on your needs.

How to Email Invoices

Before walking through the setup, here’s how emailing invoices in STRATAFOLIO compares to QuickBooks. In STRATAFOLIO, creating and emailing are separate, deliberate steps, so you control exactly when invoices go out. You can email a single invoice or multiple at once, and tenants who pay via ACH can access their invoices directly in the Tenant Portal, no manual emailing needed.

Similar to Print/Preview Invoices, above, selecting the Email Invoices button will open a pop-up that allows you to set the filter criteria for the invoices you want to email directly to your tenants. The email will include a PDF attachment that is the tenant’s individual invoice, like the one shown in the section above.

NOTE: Tenant & Contact must be set up to receive invoices from STRATAFOLIO.

How to Set Up Tenants & Contacts to Receive Emailed Invoices

In order to email invoices, the Contact & Tenant set up in STRATAFOLIO must include the following:

1. The Contact in STRATAFOLIO must have an email address.
2. The Contact in STRATAFOLIO must be set up to Receive Invoice Emails.
3. The Tenant in STRATAFOLIO must have Email selected as their Invoice Delivery Preference.

To update the Contact or Tenant information, select Edit for either the Contact or Tenant, then select the options shown in the images below. You can have multiple emails receiving the invoice for the lease if you choose. All contacts that you would like to have sent the invoice to must be set up to receive invoice emails and have a valid email address. Each time the invoice is emailed, all of the contacts with that setting will receive the invoices. This is especially useful for large box stores that have several departments that will need the invoices each month.

Contact Information

Invoice Report

The Invoice Report function, located on the Rent Collection page, is especially useful for running a summary report of all the invoices for a specific building, asset, or time period. As with the other buttons discussed above, selecting the Invoice Report button will open a window where you can filter and set the date range for the report. Choose Run Report, and a PDF file will be downloaded to your computer. The PDF will summarize invoice information by asset.

TIP: The last page of the Invoice Report is a summary of Invoice Report Totals, which will show you the total amount invoiced for this report.

Single vs. Bulk Invoicing

Read this for step-by-step instructions on how to add Single or Bulk Invoices in STRATAFOLIO.

Can I Delete an Invoice

Draft Invoices can be edited, updated, or deleted in STRATAFOLIO until they are finalized. Users with permission to edit invoices, such as the Property Manager, Manager, and Admin roles, can add or remove invoice line items while the invoice is still in Draft status. However, only users with an Administrator role can delete an invoice.

Lastly, once an invoice is finalized in STRATAFOLIO, any changes to the invoice must be made in QuickBooks. Any changes made in QuickBooks will be reflected on the invoices shown in STRATAFOLIO once the account is synced.

Error Messages

If you try to invoice a tenant that is not set up for invoicing in STRATAFOLIO, or if you try to email an invoice to a tenant without an email address, you will see an error like this: