Creating a Transaction
How to create a new transaction and what the transaction, linking, and financial fields control.
From Accounts > Transactions, click New Transaction to open the transaction popup. In multi-business setups, the popup can start on a Business tab first. After that, the live form is split into Basic Information and Financial Information, with a read-only Recurring Schedule tab appearing only when the entry belongs to a scheduled transaction. The order still matters because the links you choose early on change what makes sense later in the form.
Basic Information
- Transaction Type: Choose whether this is a Charge, Payment, Expense, Tip, or Adjustment. Transfer is not available from this popup.
- Entry Date: This usually defaults to today. Change it only when the money event happened on a different day.
- Customer: Link the transaction to the customer when the ledger line belongs to a specific account rather than the business generally.
- Invoice: Use this once the correct customer is selected and the transaction belongs to one invoice in particular.
- Service: Use this when the money entry is tied to one service and you want that relationship visible later.
- Job: Link the job when the transaction belongs to one job record. If you pick a job first, Work Planner back-fills the customer from that job.
- Payment Method: Choose the method when the way the customer paid matters for fees, reporting, or later traceability.
- Payment Fee: This is read-only. It appears only for payment entries where the chosen payment method carries a flat fee or percentage fee.
- Expense Category: Use this for expense-style entries so the cost lands in the right category later.
- Description: Keep this plain and recognisable. It becomes part of the search index on the Transactions list.
Financial Information
- Amount: Enter the full amount of the transaction.
- VAT Rate (%): Set the percentage only when VAT applies to the transaction.
- VAT: This is calculated for you from the amount and VAT rate.
- Net Amount: This is also calculated automatically so your VAT split stays consistent.
- Payment Reference: Use this for a bank reference, cheque number, gateway reference, or other identifier you may need to search later.
- Missed: Leave this alone unless the entry is meant to record a missed charge or missed event rather than a normal completed one.
Recurring Schedule Section
If the transaction is being created from a recurring workflow, a Recurring Schedule section can appear. It is read-only on this popup. Future recurring transactions are managed from Scheduled Transactions, so this screen only edits the individual occurrence in front of you.
What Happens After Save
- It lands in the ledger immediately: The new entry appears on the Transactions list straight away.
- Fee expense can be created: If you save a payment with a fee-bearing payment method, Work Planner can create the related fee expense automatically.
- Links follow the record: Customer, job, invoice, service, payment method, and expense category links are all carried into the detail view and search results.
Related articles
- Transactions List: Shows where the new entry appears after saving.
- Editing a Transaction: Useful when an entry already exists and needs correcting.
- Linked Customer, Job, and Invoice Selector Flows: Covers the selector behaviour in more detail.