Accounting Policies & Settings

What each Books setting does — numbering, terms, tax, late fees, deposits, reminders, statements, online payments, approvals, accounting basis, fiscal year, rounding, job costing and AI.

Policies are the settings that decide how your books behave. Change them in Accounting → Settings → Policies. Every change is saved to the audit log, and any setting can be put back to its default.

Numbering

Prefixes and digits for invoices, estimates, bills, payments, sales orders and purchase orders, and the next invoice number — set it to continue the sequence from your old system. A bill you record without the vendor’s number gets one with your bill prefix; a payment’s number is printed on its receipt.

Sales, tax and terms

Default payment terms set the due date of a new invoice that has none.
Default sales tax rate is charged on a new invoice’s taxable lines when you leave the tax blank. A tax-exempt customer is never charged it, and a tax amount you type is used as typed. Prices include tax works the tax out of the total instead of adding it.
Late fees: when on, the term is printed on every invoice issued while it is on, and a fee of that percentage of the unpaid balance is charged the day after the due date and every 30 days after. Only those invoices carry it. Check your state’s limits before switching it on.
Default deposit: the percentage asked for on a new estimate. When the customer accepts, a deposit invoice is raised, and the final invoice subtracts it.
Billable expense markup and the default memo printed on invoices.

Payments and reminders

Accept online payments shows Pay now on your customer portal and payment links. It needs an approved payout account.
Card surcharge adds a percentage when a customer pays by credit card. The customer sees it and agrees to it before paying; a debit card or a bank payment is never surcharged, and states that forbid it are refused.
Allow customer autopay lets a customer turn on automatic payment of every invoice from their portal. Only the customer can turn it on.
Invoice reminders go out a set number of days before and after the due date, and customer statements every week or month, to customers who have an email address and owe you money.

Approvals

Require approval for bills and purchase orders at or above a threshold, and require that every bill references a purchase order.

Accounting

Accounting basis: accrual counts income and expenses when invoiced and billed; cash counts them when paid. Reports open on it, and you can switch a single report between the two.
Fiscal year start: a profit and loss opens from the start of your financial year, and year-end close closes your twelve months.
Rounding: how a fraction of a cent is rounded when the books work out an amount.
Lock posted transactions: when on, a posted entry can only be reversed. When off, a journal entry you made by hand can be deleted while its period is open, with a reason, and the whole entry is kept in the audit log.

Job costing and AI

A labor burden adds payroll taxes, insurance and benefits to every hour on a job, shown separately from the wages paid; it changes job costing only, never anybody’s pay. AI settings switch automatic categorization, anomaly detection and receipt reading on or off. Anomaly detection switched off says so — it never reads as nothing found.

Frequently asked questions

What happens if I switch accounting basis mid-year?

Reports for that year mix the two. Plan the change with your accountant, ideally at year-end.

Does changing the late fee change invoices already sent?

No. An invoice carries the late-fee term it was issued with.

How do I know if a setting has been changed from its default?

Each setting shows who last changed it, and offers the default back.

Related guides

Related features and guides

The Accounting Audit Log — Documentation. How Seayora’s immutable, append-only audit log records every accounting action for accountability and trust.
Accounting Automations — Documentation. How to build rules that act when something happens in your books — tell you, email a customer a note, hold a bill for approval, tag a class or suggest an account.
Books Modules — Documentation. How to switch off the parts of your books you do not use — recurring invoices, progress invoicing, budgets, bank feeds, the customer portal and more — and what switching one off does.
Reducing Late Rent with Autopay and Automated Reminders — Guide. How autopay, scheduled reminders, and clear late-fee policies work together to cut down on late and missed rent payments.
How to Invoice Clients and Get Paid Faster — Guide. Practical invoicing tips for service businesses — what every invoice needs, how to set terms, and how automated reminders and online payments shorten the wait for your money.
Bank Feeds & Reconciliation — Feature. Connect bank feeds and reconcile transactions against the ledger, so what the books say and what the bank says actually match.