Fees, retainers and subscriptions that write themselves
You define once what is invoiced, to whom and how often. From then on Cairos puts together the period's invoice with its series, its due date and its lines, and you decide whether it comes out as a draft to review or issued directly.
What you define once and what comes out every month
A recurring invoice in Cairos is not a duplicated invoice: it is a template with a frequency of its own, which knows when it is due and keeps count of what it has already generated.
Whatever the frequency
Weekly, monthly, quarterly or annual, and with an interval: «every 2 months» or «every 3 quarters» work too. With a start date, an optional end date and the next issue always in sight.
Draft or issued, you choose
Each subscription decides whether it leaves a draft to review — the normal thing when the hours change every month — or whether it issues directly, which is what you want on a fixed-amount fee.
With its due date and its payment method
Days to due date, payment method, IRPF withholding and recargo de equivalencia are stored in the subscription itself, so the period's invoice comes out complete and there is nothing to touch up one by one.
Fixed costs too
The rent, the gestoría's fee, the insurance and the utilities are defined the same way, with their supplier and their category. If they are on direct debit, they are marked as paid when they are generated, and you see their equivalent monthly cost even if they are paid once a year.
They show up in the cash flow forecast
Active sales subscriptions and fixed costs are projected forward in the cash flow forecast. That is exactly what makes cash predictable: knowing what is going to come in and go out even though the document does not exist yet.
Membership fees go separately
If what recurs is the fees of an association or a club, they are not invoiced: services to members are exempt from VAT and issuing them as invoices would throw the 303 out. That is handled by the members and fees module, with its bank batch.
Screenshot of the ERP: What you define once and what comes out every month
Three ways of charging the same thing every month
The module is the same; what changes is the relationship you have with the client and which document belongs to it.
- A professional retainer: a fixed amount, an invoice issued directly on the 1st and payment due in 30 days.
- Maintenance: a fixed quarterly amount, with a draft first so you can add the period's extra hours.
- An annual licence or subscription: one invoice a year, with the next issue date in sight all year long.
- An association membership fee: a receipt, not an invoice, and a SEPA batch to collect it through the bank.
- A fixed expense on direct debit: it is generated already marked as paid, without going through receipts.
- Each subscription keeps a count of how many documents it has generated and when the last one was.
They come out on their own, and you can fire them yourself too
There is a task on the server that runs every day and does two things: it issues the invoices for the subscriptions that are due and creates the day's recurring expenses. Nobody has to be there and the program does not have to be open.
You still have the button, because there are months when you want to get ahead: you go into subscriptions, see the ones falling due and generate them when it suits you. And if you would rather check before anything goes out, each subscription can be set to leave a draft instead of issuing; there you do have a step of your own, and it is voluntary.
One plumbing detail worth knowing, because it explains why this is reliable: that task is the only one in the program that creates documents with an invoice number, so it is protected with a secret of its own and with a test that checks it cannot be called without it. A task like that, left open, would be the quickest way to fill everybody's accounts with invoices.
Every repeated payment has its own document, and it is not always an invoice
It is the most expensive mistake in anything charged periodically, and it comes out very late: usually at the first review of the 303.
If you provide a service to a customer, it is an invoice. The lawyer's retainer, the repair shop's maintenance contract, the annual software licence. It goes with its VAT, its series and its record, and it enters the books like any other.
If it is the fee of a member of your association, it is not. Services provided to members by a non-profit organisation are exempt from VAT, so what belongs there is a fee receipt, not an invoice. Issuing them as invoices puts a taxable base into the 303 and the 390 that should not be there, and squaring that afterwards means correcting a whole year.
If it is an advance before starting, the usual thing is a pro forma: it shows the amount, it does not make the tax chargeable, and it becomes an invoice when you are paid.
In Cairos each one lives where it belongs: subscriptions in invoicing, membership fees in the members module with their bank batch, and pro formas in their own series. There is nothing to decide every month, only the first time.
What happens when the amount changes
A retainer goes up, a maintenance contract is extended, a client cancels halfway through the year. All of that is changed in the subscription, not in the invoices already issued: what has been issued never changes, which is exactly what has to happen with a document that is already in the books.
There are two ways of ending one, depending on what you want to keep. Setting an end date leaves the subscription closed in its place, with its history and its counter. Deactivating it stops it without deleting it, and it can be switched on again if the client comes back. Deleting it only makes sense when it was created by mistake.
If what changes is the price for every client at once, today it is edited subscription by subscription: there is no bulk increase by percentage.
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Frequently asked questions
Write down once what you charge every month
And spend that time on what does not repeat.
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