# Introduction - Vendor Payments

A vendor payment records what you paid a supplier and which of their bills it settles.

**Video coming soon:** Paying a supplier, allocating it across their bills, and what to check before the money leaves.

It is the mirror of a payment received and the end of the purchase chain. Like its counterpart it touches no stock at all: the goods were counted in at the receive, and paying for them is a separate matter settled later.

![The Vendor Payments screen listing payments made to UK suppliers, with columns for the payment date, payment number, reference, vendor, the bill it settles, the payment mode and the amount in pounds.](https://www.sorviai.com/help/inventory/vendor-payments/payments-list.png)

*Each payment names the bill it clears and how the money left.*

## The payment and what it settles

- **The payment** (what left): An amount, a date, a mode and the account it came out of. This is a fact about your bank.
- **The allocation** (what it clears): Which bills the money is applied against. One payment can settle several, and it can settle part of one.

Paying a round sum against a vendor's account without naming the bills is allowed and is sometimes what actually happened. It sits as an unallocated payment until somebody decides which bills it clears.

![A vendor payment record showing its number, date, mode and amount, the supplier, and the bills it has been applied against, alongside an activity panel.](https://www.sorviai.com/help/inventory/vendor-payments/payment-detail.png)

*The payment and its allocation side by side. Changing the second leaves the first untouched.*

## What to check before paying

The point of the purchase chain is that this is the moment the earlier steps pay off.

- Does the bill match the receive, or are you about to pay for goods that never arrived?
- Is there a vendor credit outstanding that should reduce this payment?
- Are the vendor's payment terms being met, early or late?

> **Warning:**
>
> **Paying a bill nobody matched is where the money goes**
>
> Once a payment has left, a discrepancy becomes a conversation with a supplier rather than a correction on a document. The check costs a minute at the point of payment and is close to unrecoverable afterwards.

> **Tip:**
>
> **Apply credits before paying, not after**
>
> A vendor credit applied to the bill reduces what you send. Paying in full and then holding a credit means you have lent the supplier money until the next order.