Accounts & payments

Take payments, read a client's account, issue statements, and correct charges that were wrong.

Every client has one running account. Consultations, hospital stays, boarding, grooming and sales all post charges to it; payments and credits reduce it. The balance is simply the sum of everything on it.

Taking a payment#

Open the client — from the payment queue, or by searching.
Press Statement on their record to open the account and see what they owe.
Press Pay in the footer.
Choose how they paid: Eft, Card, Cash or Adjustment.
Check the date — it defaults to today, which is what you want at the counter.
Enter a reference number and the amount. Both are required; the footer will not let you save without them.
Save.

The payment appears on the account immediately, the balance drops, and the client comes off the payment queue.

Note

There is a tick box on this screen to email this client their statement. Whether it starts ticked is a practice setting; you can override it on any individual payment. It is greyed out for a client with no email address on file.

Careful

Adjustment is not a payment — it is for writing a balance up or down where no money changed hands. It asks for a comment, and will not save without one.

Tip

Taking part of what is owed is fine — enter the amount actually handed over. The rest stays on the account and shows up in the aged analysis.

Reading a client's account#

Client record›Statement

The account lists every entry with its type, date, description and amount. Positive amounts are charges; negative amounts are payments and credits.

Note

The button that opens this screen is labelled Statement on the client record, which is a little misleading — it opens the account. Sending an actual statement is a separate button (Print statement / Email statement) once you are here.

Type	Means
Consultation	A finished consultation or dispense.
Sale	A counter or shop sale.
Hospital / Boarding	A discharged stay.
Grooming	A finished groom.
Receipt	Money received from the client.
Manual debit	A charge added by hand.
Reversal credit	The credit written when a charge is reversed.

Tap the … button on an entry to reveal what you can do with it — print or email the invoice, print or email the itemised detail, and reverse it. Only one entry shows its buttons at a time, so the list stays readable.

Note

A long account loads in pages — See more at the bottom fetches the next batch.

The 60 and 90 day badges#

Next to a client's outstanding balance you will sometimes see a small coloured badge — an amber 60 days or a red 90+ days. It is telling you how old the debt is, not how much it is.

Badge	Means	What it is for
none	The balance is current, or under 60 days old.	Nothing to do.
60 days (amber)	Money has been outstanding for around two months.	Worth mentioning while the client is in front of you.
90+ days (red)	Around three months or more.	Should not be extended further credit without a decision from somebody who can make it.

The badge appears in four places, which is deliberate — it follows the client to wherever money is about to change hands:

The client record, next to the balance.
The Pay screen, so whoever takes the payment can see it.
The Add Debit screen, before more is added to the account.
The consultation patient panel — so the vet knows before they start work.

Tip

The badge on the consultation is the one people miss. Seeing it before you begin is the difference between a quiet word at the start of a visit and an awkward conversation at the front desk after it.

Note

For the whole picture rather than one client, use the account book — it ages every balance across current, 30, 60 and 90 days so you can work the worst first.

Adding a charge by hand#

Debit adds a charge that did not come from a visit or a sale — a missed-appointment fee, a cremation charge passed on, an agreed contribution.

Open the client's account and press Debit in the footer.
Check the date, then enter a clear description — the client will see it — a reference number, and the amount.
Save.

Note

Enter the VAT-inclusive amount. A debit is a flat charge on the account; FastVet does not break tax out of it the way it does for a priced item.

Careful

A manual debit charges the client but takes nothing out of stock and records nothing clinically. Use a sale or a consultation if goods or services actually changed hands.

Reversing a charge#

Who can do this

Reversing needs the Doctor role. Grooming charges are the one exception — Groomer can reverse those too.

Charges are never deleted. Reversing marks the original entry as reversed and writes a matching credit, so the account still shows what happened and when it was put right.

Open the client's account and find the charge.
Press the … button on it to show its actions.
Choose Reverse — or Readmit on a hospital or boarding charge, which is the same thing under a name that says what else it does.
Confirm.

For a consultation, a stay or a groom, reversing also reopens the underlying record so it can be corrected and finished again. The reversed entry stays on the account marked Transaction reversed, with the credit beside it.

Note

Reversal is the right tool for “we charged the wrong thing”. For “they are not going to pay”, talk to your practice about how it wants bad debt handled — reversing hides the fact that work was done.

Statements#

Open the client's account and use Print statement or Email statement at the top of the screen. Email statement only appears where the client has an email address on file. Your practice can also have statements sent automatically, and can email one every time a payment is taken — see Email & notifications.

Tip

Statements are the polite first step on an overdue balance. Work from the aged analysis in the account book so you start with the oldest debt.

Invoices#

Finishing a consultation, discharging a stay or completing a sale raises an invoice. If automatic invoice emails are switched on the client receives it straight away; otherwise you can send it from the account entry at any time.

The invoice is dated the day the work happened, not the day it is sent.
Whether VAT is broken out or included is a practice setting.