Restaurants and shops pay suppliers in more than one way. The vegetable supplier is paid in cash at the back door, the meat supplier sends a monthly invoice paid by transfer, and the packaging company wants a deposit before it delivers. If each payment is recorded in a different place, the same cost ends up in the books twice, or a bill stays open long after it was paid.
In Wink You the bill is the single record of what you owe. Here is how to create it, approve it, pay it from the bank or the till, and keep the supplier balance right.
Create the bill
From a received purchase order
Open Wink Accounting, then Bills under Purchases, and click Create bill from purchase order. Pick the order you received and click Preview to see each delivered item, the quantity to bill and the price, then Use purchase order. The supplier, branch, due date and lines fill in for you, one line per delivery at the received price. Type the number on the supplier's paper bill in Supplier reference, check the total and click Create Draft.
Or by hand
Click Create bill and choose the supplier; the payment terms and due date fill in. Enter the Supplier reference, then for each line choose the account, for example Food Cost, describe what you bought and enter the price before VAT with its tax rate. The VAT is added for you. Click Create Draft. If the same supplier invoice number was used before, you are warned, and you save it anyway only if it really is a different invoice.
Approve and pay from the bank
- Open the menu on the bill's row and choose Approve bill.
- When you pay, click Paid, check the payment date, payment method and bank account, then Record payment in full.
- Pay bills lets the owner or accountant pay several selected bills at once.
- When the transfer appears on your bank statement, bank reconciliation suggests the recorded payment, so it is matched instead of being paid twice.
Cash paid to a supplier at the till
When a cashier pays a supplier from the drawer, it is recorded on the POS as a pay out, and the supplier can be picked there. Link it to the bill so the bill shows as paid or partly paid:
- Open Cash, tab Pay outs, press the pay out, then Link to a supplier bill. Pick the supplier first if the cashier did not.
- The supplier's open bills with their balance due, and approved purchase orders with no bill yet, are listed. Enter how much goes to each; Left to link shows what is still free. Press Save.
- One pay out can be split across several bills, and part of it can stay unlinked. You cannot link more than the pay out, or more than a bill's balance due.
- Paying an order that has no bill yet is money paid in advance. When the bill arrives, apply that payment to it in Accounting.
- Remove link, with a reason, undoes it and the bill's balance comes back. The supplier's page has a Cash paid tab with every pay out made to them.
In the books, a linked pay out moves from the expense to what you owe the supplier, so the cost is counted once, on the bill, and its VAT is also taken from the bill. Linking needs Accounting to be on for the business, which it is unless Wink You switched it off.
Keeping supplier balances right each month
- Create every bill from its purchase order where there is one, so the bill matches what was really received.
- Approve bills as they arrive, so the due dates you see are real.
- Before the month ends, open Cash, Pay outs and filter for pay outs that are not linked to a bill yet; link each one.
- Apply any advance paid on a purchase order to the bill when it arrives.
- Import the bank statement and confirm the suggested bill payments, so every transfer is tied to a bill.
- Check the supplier's Cash paid tab when a supplier queries what they were paid in cash.
What Wink You does not do
It records supplier payments; it does not send them. Bank transfers are made from your bank, and cash leaves the drawer by hand. A pay out is never edited or deleted: a wrong one is voided with a reason, and if it was linked to a bill the link is removed first, so the bill shows as unpaid again.
Frequently asked questions
How do I turn a delivery into a supplier bill?
In Bills, click Create bill from purchase order, pick the received order, preview it and click Use purchase order. Add the supplier reference and create the draft.
How do I record cash paid to a supplier from the till?
The cashier records it as a pay out on the POS and picks the supplier. Then in Cash, Pay outs, open it and press Link to a supplier bill.
What if a supplier sends the same invoice twice?
When you type a supplier reference that was already used for that supplier, Wink You warns you before saving. Only continue if it really is a different invoice.
Is VAT counted twice when cash at the till pays a bill?
No. Once the pay out is linked, its cost and its VAT are taken from the bill, and the pay out only reduces what you owe the supplier.
Can I pay several supplier bills at once?
Yes. The owner or accountant can select bills and use Pay bills to record the payment for all of them together.
Learn more
See winkyou.com/products/accounting-reports for the books and winkyou.com/products/inventory for purchasing and stock. The video guides are winkyou.com/support/finance-and-reports/how-to-record-and-pay-a-supplier-bill and winkyou.com/support/purchasing/how-to-turn-a-received-order-into-a-supplier-bill.