ONE INVOICE HELP FILE

MAIN SCREEN   top

The One Invoice application is designed to be an easy to use tool, for keeping track of what an employee or contractor does during their day.  Once logged into the application the user is capable of creating new records of what they did.  They are also able to edit existing records and create reports/invoices based on these records.

To create a new event the user can press the "New" button at the bottom of the main screen.  Or double click on the baby blue of the main list.  This will bring the user to a blank Event form .  Below I have clicked on an event in the list.  It's details have populated the bottom part of the form.  As a the user who created this record I am able to edit it directly here.  I may also choose to double click the event in the list, and have it show up in the original event form.  This would allow for a more detailed editing and a larger (maximized) view of the event details. 

As you may have guessed the user can choose to show all records for all users/clients/dates or they may wish to filter out for only information they are interested in.  Sorting of the main list is done simply by clicking on the column you wish to sort on.  

CLIENTS  top

The first thing you must set up are clients.  For a firm that has but one client or too many to mention this could refer to departments.  It is simply a way to filter events.  

PROJECTS top

Projects are quite simple in nature.  When creating an event you will not only want to know who you're working for but what are you working on.  Each project has a desired outcome and most likely a reason for doing it.  Avoid the temptation of skipping these fields.  Writing down a clear description of the finished product and a personal reason for doing this project will often result in a much better end result and a significantly better experience while working on said project.

As with the clients projects may be deleted only when there are no events associated.  They may also be marked as not active when they are complete and you the user no longer wish to have them appear in the list of projects on the event form.  

You may have noticed that there are tax levels for each project.  As this application creates invoices it is sometimes important to be able to set the rate of tax you wish to charge for each project.  This rate will be calculated in to the totals when you create your invoice.   The value is a percentage.  

TYPE OF WORK top

 The type of work that you do depends quite a bit on the job you have.  I being a programmer have the above 7 items.  Most likely if you are a programmer you will have the same or a small variation.  Since you may wish to sort the events you store by the type of work you are doing this form will be most helpful.  

EDIT INVOICE TITLE top

The invoice title appears at the top of every invoice that this application creates.  Should you wish to have your company name, address and business/tax number show up, this is the form you need to use.   The use is quite straight forward. 

EVENTS (aka Accomplishment)  top

Events are the main type of data for this app. Each day you work you can create multiple events.  These are used to create the invoice and a report should your clients or bosses wish to see what you did for the time you billed.

 The event form is quite easy to use.  You select new from the main screen and you are given the above dialog box. Select from the list the client project and type of work.  Then select how long you were working on the task and what dollar rate you receive for your work.  If you are not paid by the hour or this value doesn't change then leaving it blank is valid.  For your own bookkeeping I'd suggest filling it in anyway.  

The planned outcome may or may not always be accomplished.  Using the description of what was done is quite handy when you wish to confirm that a task was indeed worked on.  Often I am called upon to refresh my memory or that of my clients.  "What was the last thing you did?"  When the work occurred several months ago I can filter by client and project and give a detailed report as to what was done.  This form maximizes so feel free to be verbose. Most employers will appreciate it and you will definitely like the reference should you need it. 

REPORTS AND INVOICES top

A report is a listing of the events selected in chronological order.  It is created as an rtf which allows for printing and e-storage as well as emailing.  The file created may be edited in almost any word processor.  This allows for spell checking and other formatting you may wish to apply to customize the resulting document. 

An Invoice on the other hand is simply a table of the hours you worked on projects and their corresponding dollar amount.  It is then totaled and placed in a reasonably simple format.  This too is created as an RTF to allow for the printing storage and transmission of the document.  There are no details as to what was done for the projects listed on this document.

That is why I allow you to create an Invoice/report document too.  This way you have one document with the invoice as the first page and the report as the following page.  This is the most common printout I do.  It allows the clients to see what I'm charging them and what I'm charging them for.