An invoice is a bill for one customer that shows what they owe, line by line. Any part of Rhythm that sells something, such as a membership renewal, event registration, or store order, creates an invoice here. This article explains what an invoice includes, how Rhythm keeps its number, batch, currency, balance, and status current, and why you cannot delete a record just because it appears on an invoice. A sale’s financial impact belongs to the invoice it creates, not to the order behind it, so related records connect to what was billed through the invoice.
What's on an Invoice
An invoice bills one customer for one or more lines. Each line shows the product, quantity, price, and total. The invoice also has a date, due date, currency, batch, running balance, and status, which Rhythm keeps current as you work.
A standalone invoice, like a standalone payment, is one you create manually outside a workflow such as membership, event, donation, or another order-generating process. Staff usually create one to collect a charge that does not belong on the original order, such as an additional fee found later.
An invoice keeps a snapshot of the customer’s organization from the time the invoice was created. When an order has a bill-to organization, the invoice created from that order, and any renewal tied to the same billing context, keeps that organization. If the contact’s organization changes later, existing invoices do not update retroactively. Only newly created invoices use the updated organization.
A pro forma invoice is a preview invoice. It does not belong to a batch, and you cannot post a payment, memo, or write-off against it. It shows a customer what they would owe before the sale is finalized. Once an invoice belongs to a batch and has been paid, it is no longer pro forma. Because a pro forma invoice cannot take a payment, memo, or write-off, you also cannot void or write it off like a real invoice. In the portal, it behaves more like an order you can cancel than an invoice you can void.
What a Line Can Show
A line’s product name is usually enough, but some processes add more detail automatically:
- An invoice created through the group membership process already shows each member’s name in the relevant line’s description, without extra template customization.
- Multiple event registrations on one invoice appear as separate lines, one per registrant, even when the registrants bought the same item. Rhythm does not combine them into one line with a higher quantity.
- When an order line item has its own description, such as from a group registration, membership order, or online-store order billed to a different ship-to contact, the invoice line created from it can carry that description over.
Whether an invoice shows a more specific label, such as an event name, course name, or package name, depends on both the source record and the invoice template. The underlying order or registration must include that detail, and your invoice template must have a merge field that pulls it in. If a description you expect is missing from a printed or emailed invoice, check both places.
Warning
If a line’s description disappears from invoice output after you edit the invoice, check whether the description is still on the line. Invoice output shows a description only when it exists on the invoice, so an edit that clears it also removes it from what customers see.
Invoice templates have a few limits to know before you customize one:
- A merge field for a contact’s name works in most cells of an invoice template, but not when you place it on the same line as the product description.
- Text that a template adds around a product name, such as a year prefix, is only for presentation. It appears on the printed or emailed invoice, but it is not part of the product name returned by Query Center or other product-name fields.
- Current template data for membership chapters does not distinguish a national dues line from a chapter dues line. Both can reference only the same chapter name because that is the only chapter-level detail currently available to the template.
- Looping over an invoice’s memberships to print a membership term date can print that date more than once when the invoice involves an organization membership with flowdown or assigned members. Reference one membership record, for example with
{{#with (lookup @root.memberships 0)}}, instead of looping over the full collection to avoid the repeat. - A membership's term start date does not render on its own. The template must explicitly loop over the invoice's memberships and reference the term-start field inside that loop, the same way a line-item loop works for other fields.
- A line-item loop in an invoice template must open and close with matching Handlebars syntax, for example:
{{#each line_items}}
{{this.description}}
{{/each}}Closing the loop with the collection’s name instead of {{/each}} breaks the template preview and stops line-item merge fields, such as a ship-to name, from rendering.
- Changing the formatting of the line-item, subtotal, or tax table in a template can make quantity and product-description merge fields disappear from the preview. If fields disappear right after a formatting change, check the table structure first.
Rhythm can also display a line’s quantity or price incorrectly without changing what the invoice actually charges:
- A missing parameter in an invoice template can leave quantity and unit price blank on generated invoices, even though the invoice’s total still calculates correctly.
- Some invoice templates, including a default starting template, have printed a blank product line with $0.00 in the Unit Price and Total columns while the invoice’s own total stayed correct.
- An image in an invoice email template can appear broken when the uploaded image file’s name contains spaces. Removing the spaces from the file name has resolved this.
Billing runs and one-off applications, such as membership and sponsorship orders processed outside a billing run, use the invoice template selected for generated invoices. You do not choose a separate template for each one.
Numbering and the Due Date
Rhythm does not generate a purchase order number automatically. If a sale needs one, add it afterward by editing the invoice’s own details, or by updating the order so the invoice template’s PO merge field can pull it from there.
Rhythm automatically gives each new invoice the next number in your Rhythm account’s invoice sequence. Nobody chooses the number manually. Rhythm takes the number before the invoice is saved, so the sequence keeps the gap if the save fails afterward. That is expected and does not mean anything is wrong. A missing number also does not necessarily mean an invoice is missing. If you need to confirm whether a specific invoice exists, search for it directly instead of relying on the sequence alone. Some older gaps also trace back to past issues where invoices and payments were removed, which can make older sequences hard to reconstruct. The same applies to credit memo numbers.
Warning
Invoice numbers are not guaranteed to be unique. Rhythm does not enforce uniqueness on the number itself, so two invoices can occasionally share the same number.
Rhythm calculates the due date from the invoice’s payment terms. It looks up the payment terms and adds their number of days to the invoice date. If Rhythm cannot find payment terms, the due date defaults to the invoice date. Changing payment terms later does not move due dates on invoices that already used them, because you can edit the due date and terms independently after an invoice exists. This is also why an invoice created by a billing run can still show its creation date as the due date after you configure payment terms. The invoice used the payment terms, or lack of payment terms, that applied when it was created, not terms added or changed afterward. Before you can select a new due-date option, such as 60 days, the matching payment terms record must already exist in Finance & Billing › Setup › Payment Terms.
If the due date or payment terms on an invoice do not match what you expect, check which process created it. It may still be using a default due-upon-receipt configuration, or a different process-level payment term than the one you expected. You may also occasionally see an invoice created by a billing run where the due date reflects the correct payment terms, but the Payment Terms field appears blank. Resaving the invoice restores the display.
Tip
An invoice’s date usually matches its order’s date, but a transaction processed late at night has occasionally been recorded a day later than expected because of time zone conversion around local midnight. If an invoice, order, or printed invoice shows a date that looks a day off from the others, this is the most likely cause.
Which Batch a New Invoice Lands In
If you do not choose a batch when you create an invoice, Rhythm assigns one from your Rhythm account’s batch assignment settings for the business unit. A pro forma invoice never receives a batch because it does not post to the ledger.
The batch, whether you choose it or Rhythm assigns it, must be able to accept the invoice. Rhythm will not save an invoice in a batch that is closed, posted, the wrong kind, or assigned to another business unit. If a batch was open when the invoice was created, you can close it later without affecting the invoices already in it. This rule applies only when the invoice is created.
An invoice you create manually from Finance & Billing › Transactions still creates real invoice and payment activity. It belongs to a batch and is included in batch downloads to your accounting software like any other invoice. What it does not create is the order behind it. Because of that, queries and reports that rely on an order relationship, such as filtering by the process a sale came through, will not include an invoice created this way. If you need that relationship preserved, process the sale through an applicable workflow, such as the online store or another dedicated process, instead of creating the invoice directly.
Currency and Totals
An invoice bills in one currency. If that currency is not the business unit’s base currency, the business unit must support it as a foreign currency. Otherwise, Rhythm refuses the invoice because the currency is invalid. When an invoice uses a foreign currency, Rhythm converts the totals into the business unit’s base currency using the latest available exchange rate. It does not use the rate from the invoice date, so a back-dated foreign-currency invoice still converts at today’s rate.
If an invoice has a line with a negative balance, such as a discount or credit line, Rhythm spreads that negative amount across the invoice’s other positive lines when the invoice is first created. This makes the discount reduce what those lines owe instead of leaving the discount line with a negative amount owed. Rhythm spreads the negative amount only at creation. If you adjust the invoice later, each line’s balance resets to its own total.
Balance and Status Stay Automatic
Every time you save an invoice, Rhythm recalculates each line’s balance, which is the amount still owed after payments and write-offs. Rhythm also recalculates the invoice’s overall balance and sets the status to paid, cancelled, or open based on those balances. You do not set an invoice’s status directly because it follows what is still owed. Since this recalculation runs on every save, the status stays correct as payments, memos, and write-offs are applied over time.
An order’s displayed Less Payments and Balance Due figures refresh from this invoice-side recalculation instead of staying static. If an order’s payment summary looks out of date, saving its invoice again can correct it.
An invoice with a remaining balance stays open even when the order behind it is otherwise complete. If a credit memo only partly offsets the original total, the invoice stays open for what is left. To close it fully, you need a payment, another credit memo, or a write-off for the remaining amount. This applies to invoices created by a billing run too. A billing run can complete without errors and still leave open invoices behind, and cleaning those up afterward is a manual step.
Reminder emails and similar automated messages follow the invoice’s recorded status, not what an earlier message appeared to show. If a payment has not yet been officially recorded on the invoice, an open-invoice reminder can still go out even if a prior communication seemed to say otherwise.
Canceling an order or invoice applies a credit that clears the invoice to a $0.00 balance. On the public payment link, that shows as "Invoice Paid." This is expected behavior, not a sign that something is misconfigured.
Rhythm also checks on every save that the invoice lines add up to the stated totals. If they do not, Rhythm refuses to save the invoice. Void invoices and invoices imported from another source are not checked by this rule.
Warning
A small number of older invoices can show an incorrect status, such as Paid, left over from a since-fixed issue with how status was calculated after a cancellation, void, or reversal. Because status is recalculated only when an invoice is saved, an invoice that has not been saved again since the fix can still show its old, incorrect status. This does not affect the invoice’s underlying sub-ledger amounts, which stay correct even when the displayed status does not.
If an invoice’s balance does not look right after a cancellation, saving it again through Edit Details is often enough to make Rhythm sync it correctly and show the expected balance.
Invoices in Reports and Queries
Because invoice numbers are not guaranteed to be unique, use an invoice’s ID rather than its number in Query Center and other reporting when you need a field that reliably identifies one specific invoice.
A batch’s date does not tell you when an invoice was paid. Invoices are batched whether they are paid or not. An invoice paid at the time of purchase can land in the same batch as its payment, but a payment made later is usually recorded in a different batch than the invoice.
The invoice query field Payment Method (Order) reflects only the payment method used at checkout for the original order. It stays blank when the order was set up to capture payment later, so do not rely on it for reporting a payment applied after the fact.
When you build an accounts-receivable report, decide up front whether you want the invoice line item’s balance due or the order’s balance due. The two fields can produce different totals for the same records, so mixing them in one report can make the totals hard to reconcile.
Rhythm also keeps a historical, point-in-time view of your invoices in monthly snapshots. An invoice stays visible in each monthly snapshot until its payment posts. Then it stops appearing starting with the following snapshot period, but it does not disappear retroactively from snapshots already taken.
Tip
If a renewal-related query unexpectedly returns invoices with a negative balance, this can be a lingering display issue rather than a pricing problem. Refreshing, meaning resaving, the affected invoices clears the negative balance without changing the pricing or products on the order or invoice.
Deleting Invoices
You can bulk-delete only invoices that are already voided or pro forma. Other invoices are not eligible for mass deletion. To clean up incorrect pro forma invoices, such as a batch left over from a renewal notice billing run, run a query for invoices with Pro Forma equal to Yes, then use Mass Delete on the results instead of removing them one at a time.
Deleting invoices, including mass deleting them, removes only the invoice records:
- The related contact isn't deleted. Mass-deleting a pro forma invoice from an invoice query removes only the invoice. The contact record it was billed to is unaffected.
- The related order isn't deleted either. Deleting or mass-deleting an invoice leaves its order in place. Once the invoice is gone, that order can no longer be paid and is not visible on the portal side, so it becomes effectively unusable rather than actively canceled.
The reverse can also happen: deleting or canceling an order does not necessarily remove or cancel its invoice. If an invoice already has sub-ledger entries, such as from a posted payment, Rhythm keeps the invoice after its order is deleted because those entries cannot be removed with it. Canceling an order is also supposed to cancel its related invoice automatically, but a known issue means this does not always happen. If you cancel an order and its invoice stays open, check the invoice directly instead of assuming cancellation handled it.
When an invoice's related order has already been deleted, the gap can block more than the order itself. You may not be able to open the related payment from the All Transactions view, which also stops you from generating a new invoice from that payment record. If you run into this, work from the invoice or contact record instead of the deleted order's transaction history.
A past issue could make an invoice tied to an order disappear entirely, leaving no invoice for staff to find or apply payment to. That behavior has been resolved going forward, but it can still explain an old order with no invoice that you cannot otherwise account for.
Deleting a pro forma invoice does not cancel or delete the order behind it, and it does not move that order’s status to Completed. An order is not something you can pay directly, so removing its pro forma invoice alone does not complete it. The order may simply stop showing as a pending balance on the related record without actually being canceled or removed.
Tip
A membership that was dropped or terminated can leave an unpaid pro forma invoice behind on the member’s record. That invoice does not import to your accounting software, since a pro forma invoice never posts, but it still appears in accounts-receivable reporting until it is addressed.
Why a Product, Contact, or Batch Can't Be Deleted
After a product, business unit, customer, batch, or other record is named on an invoice, Rhythm blocks you from deleting that record because the invoice still depends on it. If you need to remove a record that an invoice refers to, address the invoices that use it first. For example, you might correct the invoices so they use a different product before you delete the original record.
Tip
If you cannot delete a product, contact, or business unit and do not see an obvious reason, search for invoices that reference it. Rhythm is blocking the deletion because at least one invoice, possibly an old one, still points to that record.
Warning
If Receive Payment fails to open for an invoice, check whether that invoice still references a product that no longer exists. Correcting the invoice to use an available product resolves the error and restores the button.
Related Reading
Creating a new invoice and correcting a mistake on an existing one are covered in their own task articles. Setting up payment terms, invoice types, and templates is covered separately. To learn what happens after an invoice’s batch posts, see How Posting Creates Ledger Entries.