A parent comes to the fee counter and you want everything about that family's money on one page. This guide shows how to take a part payment, hold a prepayment as an advance, apply or refund it, and print the statement.
Click Students › All Students, open Priya Brown and choose the Finance tab. Read the four figures first: Total Billed, Total Paid, Outstanding and Advance Balance. Below them are three tabs: Invoices, Financial Ledger and Student Advances.
Open Invoices and press Collect Fee. The invoice is already chosen and the Amount (PKR) is prefilled with what is still due. Change it to 500 for a part payment. Leave the allocation method on Auto (tenant default) and set Payment method to Cash. Press Collect. You see the toast Payment collected. The receipt is RCP-2026-E6M3ABPP and the invoice stays Partial.
Open Accounting. The payment is journal JE-202610-00021, "Fee collected, Priya Brown". It debits 1000 Cash 500 and credits 1100 Accounts Receivable 500.
Open Student Advances and press Receive Advance. Enter 1,000 in Amount (PKR), choose Cash and write the optional Notes, for example "Term 2 prepayment". Press Receive. The toast says Advance received. The new row is a Prepayment: original 1,000, applied 0, balance 1,000, status Active. Advance Balance shows 1,000 in amber.
On the advance row open the row menu and choose Apply. In Apply Advance to Invoice the invoice shows 1,000 outstanding. Leave the amount blank to apply the maximum and press Apply. The toast says Advance applied to invoice; the row becomes Applied with balance 0 and Outstanding falls to 0.
Receive a second advance (here 500). On its row open the menu, choose Refund, type a reason such as "Family moved to Karachi" and press Confirm Refund. The row becomes Refunded with balance 0 and the refund number is REF-2026-SEONUIDH.
Open Financial Ledger. Each invoice, payment, advance and refund is a row with a running Balance. The advance-applied row reads "1,000 (memo)": it is shown for information and does not move the balance. Press Print statement to get a printable Fee statement with the student, Outstanding: PKR 0, the time it was generated and the whole ledger. Give it to the parent.
| Mistake | What you see | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Choosing a bank method but no bank account | The dialog adds a required Bank Account field | Choose the receiving account, or use Cash if cash was handed over |
| Expecting an applied advance in Total Paid | Billed minus Paid does not equal Outstanding | Subtract the applied advance as well |
| Expecting a partial advance refund | Refund returns the whole balance | Apply the part you need first, then refund the rest |
| Item | Meaning / rule |
|---|---|
| Total Billed | All invoices for the student |
| Total Paid | Payments received (applied advances are not included) |
| Outstanding | What is still due |
| Advance Balance | Prepayments not yet applied |
| Memo row | Shown for information, does not change the ledger balance |
Why does Billed minus Paid not equal Outstanding? Total Paid does not include applied advances. Subtract the applied advance as well.
Can I refund part of an advance? No, a refund returns the whole balance. Apply the part you need to an invoice first, then refund the rest.
Why does the payment dialog ask for a bank account? Bank Transfer, Cheque, Credit Card and Debit Card add a required Bank Account field. Choose the receiving account, or use Cash if cash was handed over.
GridX SCM runs this whole workflow. See what GridX SCM does and what it costs, or browse all step-by-step guides.