The typical workflow in Zoho Books runs: Estimate (quote) to Sales Order (confirmed order) to Invoice (billing) to Payment Received (collection). The sales order stage is where you confirm exactly what the customer has agreed to buy. This is particularly useful for businesses that need to raise a purchase order to their own suppliers before they can fulfil the customer order, or for businesses that ship goods and invoice later.
Open an accepted estimate in Zoho Books and click Convert to Sales Order. All line items, quantities, rates, and tax values transfer automatically. You can also create a sales order directly without a preceding estimate. Once the sales order is saved, it appears in the Sales Orders list and can be filtered by status: Open, Partially Invoiced, Closed, or Cancelled.
When goods are ready to ship or services are complete, open the sales order and click Convert to Invoice. For partial deliveries, you can invoice a subset of the line items or a partial quantity. Zoho Books tracks how much of each sales order has been invoiced and shows the open quantity, preventing over-invoicing or missed billing.
A sales order in Zoho Books is a confirmed order document raised after a customer accepts a quote, recording items, quantities, and agreed prices before goods are dispatched or services are delivered, and before the invoice is raised.
A sales order confirms what a customer has ordered. An invoice is the billing document requesting payment. The sales order comes before the invoice in the workflow and is not recorded as revenue in accounting terms.
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