Answers
Answers to the invoice problems we hear most
Short, practical answers to the questions that come up when an invoice does not behave the way you expected: emails landing in spam, PDFs that will not open, clients claiming they never received it, vendor portals, late PO numbers. One question per page, with a real fix.
How to send an invoice without a PDF attachment
PDFs land in spam, get clipped by Gmail, and break on mobile readers. Send the invoice as a link the client can open in a browser instead.
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Delivery and viewability
Getting the invoice to the client, and knowing it landed
Why is my invoice email going to spam?
Five common reasons your invoice email lands in junk, ranked by how often each is the culprit, and what to change so the next one actually reaches the client.
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How to know if a client opened your invoice
Email read receipts are unreliable. The clean fix is to send the invoice as a link and watch the views directly. Here is what each method actually tells you.
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Client can't open my invoice PDF: what to do
The PDF reader on the client's phone is the usual culprit, followed by corporate email stripping the attachment. Here is how to diagnose it, and the cleaner fix.
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Client says they never got the invoice: how to handle it
Usually it is in their spam folder, was sent to the wrong contact, or got stripped by corporate email. Here is how to find out which, and how to stop it happening again.
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Recipient workflow
What happens after the invoice arrives
How to forward an invoice to accounts payable
If you are the recipient and need to route a vendor's invoice to AP, here is the clean way. If you are the sender, here is how to make it effortless for them.
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Client wants to add a PO number after the invoice is sent
Most invoicing tools force a reissue when a PO comes in late. Here is how to handle it without losing the invoice number or restarting the payment clock.
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Client wants me to use their vendor portal: what to do
Vendor portals are designed for the buyer, not you. Here is how to decide when to use one, when to push back, and how to keep your own records intact.
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Getting paid
When the money is slow, blocked, or not coming
Why is my client not paying my invoice?
Before you chase, find out whether they even saw it, whether something on the invoice is blocking their AP, or whether they are simply slow. Here is how to tell which, ranked by how often each is the real reason.
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Why does accounts payable keep rejecting my invoice?
AP rejects for a short list of fixable reasons: a missing PO, the wrong legal entity, a missing tax ID, or a format their system cannot read. Here is each one and how to stop the bounce-back.
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Why does my invoice have the wrong billing details?
Wrong company name, old address, missing tax ID. The buyer almost always knows their own billing details better than you do. The fix is to let them correct it on the invoice instead of emailing edits back and forth.
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Why is Gmail clipping my invoice email?
Gmail clips any message over 102 KB, hiding everything below the fold behind a 'View entire message' link, including your payment details and CTA. Here is what triggers it and how to send an invoice email that never clips.
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Why is my invoice taking so long to get paid?
Long payment cycles are rarely one big delay; they are several small ones stacked: slow delivery, an AP queue, unclear payment details, and a passive follow-up. Here is where the time actually goes, and how to cut each piece.
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