How Finance works

The two document chains everything else hangs off, what actually reaches the ledger, and why a record is never copied between screens.

Finance is not thirty unrelated screens. It is two chains, one for money coming in and one for money going out, plus the accounting that sits underneath both.

Highlights

Two chains, sales and purchases, each running from an agreement to a payment.
Each step carries its lines forward, so nothing is retyped and the two documents cannot disagree.
Draft posts nothing. A document only reaches the ledger when it leaves draft.
One record, many screens. A customer is not copied into Inventory; it is the same row.
Reports read, never write. Nothing in Reports can change a figure.

Money coming in

QuoteWhat you offered
Sales OrderWhat they committed to
InvoiceWhat you are charging
Customer PaymentWhat they paid

Not every sale uses all four. A quote is worth raising when the price is still being agreed, and a sales order when there is a gap between agreeing and delivering. When there is neither, raise the invoice directly.

If goods physically move, fulfilment sits inside that chain rather than beside it.

ConfirmOrder committed
PicklistWarehouse pulls stock
PackageBoxed and labelled
ShipmentStock leaves
InvoiceCustomer billed

Money going out

Purchase OrderWhat you agreed to buy
Purchase ReceiveWhat actually arrived
BillWhat they charged you
Vendor PaymentWhat you paid

The purchase receive is the step people skip, and it is the one that earns its keep: it records what arrived, which is how a short delivery is caught before you pay for the full order rather than after.

When something goes the other way

Neither chain is edited backwards once a document is out. Corrections get their own record, which is what keeps an audit trail intact.

What happened	What you raise	Against
You over-invoiced a customer	Credit Note	The invoice
A customer sent goods back	Return	The sales order. A return cannot be raised against an invoice.
A vendor over-billed you	Vendor Credit	The bill
Stock does not match the count	Stock Adjustment	The item
Something needs correcting in the ledger directly	Journal Entry	The accounts

What reaches the ledger

Nothing you are still drafting. This is the single most useful rule in the product, and the one behind most "why is this figure wrong" questions.

Draft

NoAppears in receivables or payables
NoCounted in a report
YesEditable in full
YesDeletable

Open or sent

YesAppears in receivables or payables
YesCounted in a report
NoEditable in full
NoDeletable

The Invoices list. Columns read Date, INV number, Reference Number, Customer, Status, Amount, Balance Due and Due Date. The Status column carries a coloured label per row: Paid on most, Overdue by 24 days on INV-00031, Partially Paid on several including INV-00030 with a balance due of 5,431.23, and Draft on INV-00020 whose balance due equals its full amount of 416.76. The foot reads Showing 1 to 25 of 34 results. — Every list carries the status. The draft at the foot is in no report until it leaves draft.

One set of records, several apps

Finance shares its records with the rest of the SorviAI suite rather than keeping its own copies. An item created in Inventory is the item you invoice; a customer created in Finance is the customer a repair ticket is raised for.

Items: Shared with Inventory and Repairs. Stock levels are one number, wherever you look at them.
Customers and vendors: Shared across the suite, including the customer and vendor portals.
Documents: A file attached to a bill in Finance is the same file, not a second upload.