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Payments

Colabmacs7/6/26About 3 min

Payments

The Payments system records money received against a Team’s billing and applies that money to either Invoices or Statements.

Payments are part of the billing workflow, but they are a distinct layer from charge generation and invoice or statement creation.

Use this page to understand:

  • what a payment record represents
  • how payment allocation works
  • how unapplied amounts are handled
  • how payments affect outstanding balances
  • which permissions control payment visibility and management

Billing Feature Required

The Payments system is available only when the billing feature is enabled.

Where Payments Fit

Billing in Colabmacs flows in this order:

Usage
  -> Charges
  -> Invoices
  -> Statements
  -> Payments

Charges, invoices, and statements determine what is owed.

Payments determine what has been received and what remains outstanding.

Payment Record

A Payment belongs to a single Team and stores the received payment details for that team.

A payment record includes:

  • the team
  • the amount received
  • the received date
  • the payment source
  • an optional source reference
  • optional notes
  • the user who recorded it
  • the allocation mode

Payment Sources

Supported payment sources include:

  • cheque
  • eft
  • credit_card
  • cash
  • internal_transfer
  • other

These sources help finance staff track how a payment was received without changing the downstream allocation workflow.

Allocation Modes

Each payment is recorded in one of two allocation modes:

  • Invoice
  • Statement

This determines what kind of billing records the payment may be applied to.

Invoice Mode

An Invoice-mode payment can be allocated only to invoices that belong to the selected team.

Use this when payment is intended to settle one or more specific project-level invoices.

Statement Mode

A Statement-mode payment can be allocated only to statements that belong to the selected team.

Use this when payment is intended to settle team-level billing after invoices have already been consolidated into a statement.

Allocation Mode Matters

A payment recorded in Invoice mode cannot later be applied to statements, and a payment recorded in Statement mode cannot later be applied to invoices.

Allocated and Unapplied Amounts

Each payment tracks two important totals:

  • Allocated Amount
  • Unapplied Amount

Allocated Amount

The Allocated Amount is the portion of the payment that has already been applied to invoices or statements.

Unapplied Amount

The Unapplied Amount is the remaining portion of the payment that has been recorded but not yet assigned to a specific invoice or statement.

This allows staff to:

  • record a payment immediately when money is received
  • apply only part of it now
  • return later and allocate the remaining balance

Payment Allocations

A Payment Allocation applies part of a payment to a single invoice or statement.

Each allocation stores:

  • the payment
  • the target invoice or statement
  • the amount applied
  • the applied date
  • optional notes

Multiple allocations can be created from one payment, as long as:

  • the total allocated amount does not exceed the payment amount
  • each allocation stays within the outstanding balance of the selected invoice or statement
  • all targets belong to the same team as the payment

How Payments Affect Balances

Payments reduce outstanding balances only on the billing records they are allocated to.

Invoice Allocations

When a payment is allocated to invoices:

  • the selected invoice balances are reduced
  • unrelated invoices are unaffected
  • statement-mode balances are not changed directly by that allocation

Statement Allocations

When a payment is allocated to statements:

  • the selected statement balances are reduced
  • invoice payment allocations are not created automatically underneath the statement

This keeps invoice-level and statement-level payment tracking separate and explicit.

If a payment allocation reduces an invoice or statement outstanding balance to zero, Colabmacs can mark that billing record as Paid.

This lets the payment workflow update billing state naturally as allocations are applied.

Managing Payments in Billing Admin

The primary operational surface for payments is the Payments tab in Billing Admin.

Staff can use that tab to:

  • review payment records
  • search by team, project, amount, source reference, or notes
  • filter by allocation mode
  • filter by source
  • filter by received date
  • record new payments
  • apply remaining unapplied balances
  • inspect payment details and allocations

Recording a Payment

When recording a payment, staff choose:

  • the team
  • the allocation mode
  • the source
  • the payment amount
  • the received date
  • optional reference and notes

They may also apply allocations immediately during the same workflow.

If no allocations are entered, the payment is still recorded and remains unapplied until staff allocate it later.

Applying a Payment Later

If a payment still has an unapplied balance, Billing Admin shows Apply Payment.

This lets staff allocate the remaining amount to additional invoices or statements later.

This is useful when:

  • payment is received before final reconciliation is complete
  • only part of the payment can be confidently assigned at first
  • a team makes one payment that needs to be split across several billing records over time

Payment Detail View

The payment detail dialog shows:

  • team
  • recorded by
  • received date
  • source
  • allocation mode
  • total amount
  • allocated amount
  • unapplied amount
  • source reference
  • notes
  • the list of allocations

Each allocation shows the target billing record, the applicable period, and the amount applied.

Permissions

Payments support both global and scoped visibility patterns.

Global Billing Permissions

Common global permissions include:

  • view payments
  • manage payments

Typical behavior:

  • view payments allows read-only access
  • manage payments allows payment recording and allocation management

Team-Scoped Visibility

Payments can also be exposed through team-scoped view payments permission.

This is useful when a facility wants a team manager or delegated billing contact to review payment history for only their own team without giving them full global billing access.

Common patterns include:

  • central finance staff with access billing admin and manage payments
  • billing reviewers with access billing admin and view payments
  • team-scoped billing viewers using scoped team roles with view payments

For broader role examples, see Admin Roles & Permissions.

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