Ask for a deposit or milestone payments on a quote

Set a quote to ask for a deposit or staged payments once the customer approves it, and hold scheduling, the work or the final invoice until each one is paid.

In the sidebar, open Sales & Billing, then Quotes, and open the quote from the list, or start a new one. The deposit settings are in the quote's Manage panel, whose page address ends in /manage.

Before you start

• Deposit schedules come with some billing plans only. When yours does not include them, a yellow note says so and the switches are greyed out.
• The quote has to be open for editing: a draft, or sent and not yet turned into work.

Steps

1. Open the actions menu (the three dots at the top of the quote) and choose Manage.
2. Open Payment options and turn on Require a payment schedule. Nova adds a 50% Deposit called Project deposit, due On quote acceptance. If the quote has no work order yet, Nova also turns on Create a work order when the quote is accepted.
3. Adjust the payment:
   • Customer label is the name the customer sees.
   • Payment type is Deposit, Progress payment or Milestone payment.
   • Calculation is a Percentage of the amount you pick under Percentage basis (the grand total with tax, the Net subtotal, or the subtotal before tax), or a Fixed amount typed in Required amount.
   • Due is On quote acceptance, Before scheduling, Before work starts, or On a specific date with a Due date and time.
4. Under Block until fully paid, tick what has to wait for this payment: Scheduling, Work start, Procurement (ordering parts) and The final invoice being sent or paid.
5. Leave Allow partial payments on if the customer may pay in pieces. Whatever you ticked stays blocked until the whole amount is in.
6. Change the Customer payment message if you want different wording.
7. For staged payments, press Add payment milestone and fill in the next one. The remove button beside each payment's heading deletes it.
8. With Create a work order when the quote is accepted on, choose the Final invoice: Draft when work is completed or Create manually. Then choose the Invoice amount source: Accepted quote, reviewing the work order's actual costs by hand, or Compose manually.
9. Close the panel and press Save on the quote.

What you see

• Each payment shows an estimated amount. The exact amount is fixed when the customer approves.
• When the customer approves the quote, or you record it with Mark approved, Nova creates the work order (unscheduled) if that switch is on, and sends the payment request to the person the quote was shared with.
• The work order cannot be scheduled or started, and the final invoice is held, for as long as the payments you set as blocks are unpaid.

If something looks different

• Deposit delivery needs attention appears in Manage after approval: the quote was never shared with a customer contact, so Nova had nobody to send the request to. Send the quote to the customer, then press Retry commercial handoff.
• Commercial handoff needs attention: Nova could not create the work order or the payment request. Press Retry commercial handoff.
• Your payments jumped back to On quote acceptance and only The final invoice being sent or paid stayed ticked: you turned off Create a work order when the quote is accepted on a quote with no work order. Without a work order there is nothing to schedule or start, so Nova keeps only the invoice hold.
• The Deposit switch in the list below the schedule only lets the quote mention a deposit. It does not ask for or hold anything. Use Require a payment schedule for that.

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