Where the work becomes money.
Invoice lines draw straight from the job records the floor already ran against. Quantity produced, consumables used, time spent. No month-end reconciliation.
Finished jobs, billed once.
Instead of separate work order and invoice software, Bulk raises the invoice from the production order itself. Jobs that reach the invoicing step are billed from the services on them, issued, and credited if needed, all on the same record the floor worked from in Production.
Billable when the route says so
A job can be billed once it reaches the Invoicing step of its routing, or at any time if your site chooses that instead. The choice is fixed once routings exist.
Lines from the work
The draft builds its lines from the services assigned to the jobs, so the customer, PO number and prices come from the order rather than being retyped.
Locked at issue
Issuing freezes the customer, seller, currency and custom fields onto the invoice, produces the PDF and marks the jobs invoiced.
Credit without rewriting
A credit note reduces what was billed without touching the issued invoice. Each invoice shows its total, what was credited and the net.
Billed at the invoicing station.
Job invoicing software usually starts from a list somebody keeps. In Bulk the list keeps itself: when a job reaches the Invoicing step of its routing, the order joins the queue at the invoicing workstation, where the ready jobs are ticked onto a draft and issued.
A queue that fills itself
Orders appear when their jobs reach the station’s invoicing step and leave the queue once the invoice is issued.
Only ready jobs can be ticked
A job that has not reached the station, is already on an invoice, is in another currency or has no service lines cannot be selected, and the row says why.
Issue, then the next order
Issue invoice locks the draft and completes the jobs’ invoicing step. Issuing needs the invoicing issue permission; without it, a supervisor issues the draft from the Invoicing page.
The station’s own numbers
Its home screen can show orders pending and jobs awaiting invoicing with urgent and overdue counts, invoices issued, and value invoiced in your organisation currency.
From the office, standard or misc.
Not every invoice starts at a station. In Finance, New invoice offers two kinds: a standard invoice raised from an order and the jobs you pick, or a misc invoice with lines you write yourself. Both follow the same approval, issue and credit rules, and both land in one list.
Standard invoice
Pick one order from the invoiceable orders, tick the jobs to bill, and the draft builds its lines from the services on them.
Misc invoice
For freight, one-off charges or extra agreements: add lines by hand, from the catalogue or from a pricing template, and attach the invoice to an order or a customer.
Part of an order at a time
The jobs you leave out stay open for a later invoice. A job already on a live invoice is not offered again, so nothing is billed twice.
Every invoice in one list
Search by invoice or order number, filter by customer, type, issue date or any column, and keep saved views.
Lines priced from the work.
Time and materials billing, with the time already recorded. Every service on the order carries a billing rule: a fixed charge per attached job, a quantity you enter, or tracked hours read from the timers on the jobs it covers, at the rate in your price book.
Three billing rules
Per attached job, Manual quantity or Tracked hours, plus percentage lines on the service subtotal or the invoice total.
Hours from the floor
A timed process hours service counts timers, manual time, adjustments and, if you choose, OEE downtime, on the resources you mark as chargeable.
Worked out per job
Hours and amounts are calculated for each job and added up, so the invoice line matches the order to the penny. A breakdown shows the hours behind the line.
From your price book
Services come from the catalogue, a rate template, or are added by hand. Prices in another currency convert at your conversion rates, and the rate is kept on the line.
Check the bill against the floor.
Manufacturing billing software should let you check a bill against the work before it goes out. A draft invoice raised from an order carries Output, Timers and Quality tabs that show only the jobs on that invoice: what they produced, the time booked and any quality issues.
Just these jobs
The Output, Timers and Quality tabs are scoped to the jobs on the invoice, not the whole order.
Missing services are flagged
Jobs with no service add nothing to the total. The draft warns about them, and at issue they come off the invoice and stay open.
Edits only in draft
Lines, services, custom fields and notes change only while the invoice is a draft, and notes save as you type.
Blocked before it goes wrong
A draft cannot start for an order with no customer or an unavailable currency, and jobs in a different currency cannot join it. A customer status can warn or block.
Sign-off from your threshold up.
Turn on the invoice approval workflow and any draft at or over the value you set goes to a named approver before it can be issued. Smaller drafts issue straight away, and leaving the value blank sends every invoice for approval.
Named approvers
Each site names a primary and a backup approver. Only they can decide, and the person who submitted an invoice cannot approve it unless one person is set as both approvers.
Decisions with a note
Approve takes an optional note. Request changes and Reject need one and return the invoice to Draft for its author to fix, and the author can recall it while it waits.
Locked while it waits
A submitted invoice cannot be edited, and the services on it are locked on the order, so another invoice for the order cannot bill them again.
Credit notes as well
Credit notes follow the same approval rule and the same approvers: submit for approval, then approve, request changes or reject.
Issued once, frozen for good.
Issuing is the one-way step. The invoice carries a number from your site’s sequential invoice numbering, 2026-INV-000148 style by default, and its customer, seller, currency and custom fields are frozen onto it, so renaming a customer later never changes what was sent.
What issue does
It sets the issue date and a due date 30 days later unless the draft already has one, generates the PDF, and marks the billed jobs invoiced so no other invoice can pick them up.
Confirmation your way
Manual (Mark sent, Confirm, Mark issued-confirmed), Immediate (issuing confirms it at once) or through a workflow. Each invoice keeps the mode it was issued under.
Void, then replace
An issued invoice is never edited. Voiding keeps it on record, with a reason if you give one, releases its jobs to be billed again and reverses any credit applied. Issued Confirmed invoices cannot be voided.
Every step on the record
The history shows each lifecycle step and each credit applied, with who acted and when, and invoice changes can start a published workflow.
Credit notes that net, not rewrite.
What is a credit note? A document that records money owed back to a customer: for a return, a discount, a dispute, goodwill or a price correction. In Bulk you raise one from the issued invoice or as a standalone credit, issue it, then apply it to that customer’s invoices.
Capped at what was billed
A credit from an invoice picks lines and quantities, never more than is left to credit on each line. Fully credited lines cannot be picked.
Applied where you choose
Issued credit goes to one or several of the customer’s issued invoices in the same currency, and never beyond an invoice’s uncredited total.
Reversible and kept
Reversing an allocation returns the credit and keeps the row marked Reversed. Voiding a credit note reverses all of its allocations.
Void or credit?
Void when the whole invoice is wrong and you will reissue it. Credit when the customer is owed an adjustment, or when the invoice is already Issued Confirmed.
What billing should answer.
Invoicing and credit notes for a manufacturer come down to a few plain questions: what is ready to bill, what each line is for, who signed it off and what was billed after credits. In Bulk every answer is read from the production record the invoice came from.
| The question | How Bulk handles it | Where you read it |
|---|---|---|
| What is ready to bill? | Jobs at the Invoicing step of their routing, or any active job if your site invoices at any time, that are not on another live invoice. | The invoicing station’s queue, and New invoice, Invoiceable orders |
| What is each line for? | Each line comes from a service assigned to the jobs, billed per attached job, by a set quantity, by tracked hours or as a percentage. | Line items and the Services panel on the draft |
| Does the bill match the floor? | The invoice shows the output, time and quality of only the jobs on it. | Output, Timers and Quality tabs on the invoice |
| Who signed it off? | At or over your threshold, a named primary or backup approver decides, not the person who submitted it unless one person holds both roles. | The approval panel and the invoice history |
| Can it change after issue? | No. Customer, seller, currency and custom fields are frozen. Corrections are a void and a replacement, or a credit note. | The “Frozen at issue” banner and the history timeline |
| How much was credited? | Credit notes applied to the invoice reduce it, and Net invoiced is the total less credits. | Invoice summary: Total, Credited, Net invoiced |
| Has the customer got it? | Mark sent, Confirm and Mark issued-confirmed record each step, or a workflow does it. | The status badge and the history |
| Is any finished work unbilled? | The Jobs Awaiting Invoicing and Orders Pending Invoicing cards count what is waiting to be billed, with urgent and overdue chips. | The invoicing station’s home |
| How many invoices are still open? | Invoicing backlog can be tracked as a KPI: by default, the average daily count of invoices in unfinished stages. | An invoicing KPI in KPIs |
The end of the thread, read in full.
Invoicing reads the order, the route, the floor’s time and output and the quality record, then hands its numbers on to KPIs and boards. That is how Bulk runs order to invoice on the same record.
- ProductionJobs reach the invoicing station, and the invoice shows their output, time and quality.
- RoutingAn Invoicing step on the route marks when a job can be billed, and issuing completes it.
- Inbound & OCRThe customer document brings the PO number and the priced services the lines build from.
- QualityThe invoice’s Quality tab shows quality results for the jobs being billed.
- OEE & AnalyticsInvoicing backlog, invoice value and credited value become KPIs.
- TeamboardsAn invoicing KPI on a teamboard opens the invoices behind the number.
Questions, answered.
What do Bulk’s invoicing and credit notes cover?
Billing the work your plant has run. Jobs that reach the invoicing step go onto a standard invoice whose lines build from the services assigned to them. The invoice is approved if you use approvals, then issued and confirmed. Credit notes, raised against an invoice or standalone, are then applied to reduce what was billed. Invoicing and credit notes are part of the Production app, so the order, its jobs and the invoice are one record.
How do finished jobs become an invoice?
When a job reaches the Invoicing step of its routing, its order appears in the queue at the invoicing station. Tick the ready jobs, check the service lines and select Issue invoice. From the office, choose New invoice, then Standard invoice, then pick the order and its invoiceable jobs. A site can instead allow invoicing at any time, without an Invoicing step.
Where do the prices on each line come from?
From the services on the production order that are assigned to the jobs being billed. Each service line is charged per attached job, by a quantity you enter, by tracked hours from the jobs’ timers, or as a percentage of the subtotal. Services come from your catalogue, a rate template or are added by hand, and you can check every price on the draft before it is issued.
Can I bill for the hours actually worked on a job?
Yes. A timed process hours service takes its quantity from time recorded on the jobs it is assigned to: timers, manual time, adjustments and, if you choose, OEE downtime, on the resources you mark as chargeable. The hourly rate comes from your pricing, and a per-job breakdown shows the hours and amount behind the line.
Can invoices need approval before they go out?
Yes, if you turn it on in the invoicing settings. Name a primary and a backup approver and, if you like, a value from which approval applies. The approver approves, requests changes or rejects with a note, and the person who submitted an invoice cannot approve it unless one person is set as both approvers. Credit notes follow the same rule.
What happens when an invoice is issued?
It locks. Bulk freezes the customer, seller, currency and custom field values onto it, sets the issue date and a due date 30 days later unless you set one, generates the PDF, and marks the billed jobs as invoiced so no other invoice can include them. Jobs on the draft with no service are left off and stay open for a later invoice.
How do I correct an invoice that has already been issued?
You never edit it. Either void it, which keeps it on record, with a reason if you give one, releases its jobs to be billed again and reverses any credit applied, then raise a replacement; or raise a credit note against it. Once an invoice is Issued Confirmed it can no longer be voided, so a credit note is the route.
How do credit notes work?
Raise one from an issued invoice, crediting chosen lines up to what is left to credit, or as a standalone credit for a customer. Give a reason: return, discount, dispute, goodwill, price correction or other. Once issued, the credit is applied to that customer’s invoices in the same currency, and each invoice shows its total, the amount credited and the net invoiced. Allocations can be reversed and stay on record.
Can one order be invoiced in parts?
Yes. A standard invoice bills the jobs you select from one order, and the rest stay open for a later invoice. A job already on a live invoice cannot be picked again, and a service already on an invoice awaiting approval or issued is not billed a second time.
Does Bulk handle payments, tax and my accounts package?
Bulk carries each invoice from draft to Issued Confirmed, and where you keep an accounts package, Bulk syncs both ways with it. The Dynamics 365 connector is live today and invoice events can start a workflow that sends the invoice records across; SAP and accounting sync are next. Payments, VAT and debt ageing are not recorded on the invoice itself.
Can I see an invoice or credit note template first?
The manufacturing invoice template and credit note template show the records you can prepare by hand. Check the fields against your business and local requirements. For the product workflow, read how to create a standard invoice and allocate a credit note in Bulk.
Re-run an order you invoiced last month.
Start a free trial, set up its services and an invoicing step, and issue the invoice from the invoicing station. No card needed.
