Before you beginDid you know you can import your customers in bulk from a spreadsheet? Read our Import customer contacts guide > When you enter transactions such as sales invoices, we use the information that you've set on the customer record to determine the following: - Category - The default ledger account is 4900 Other Income
- Due date - This is set to 30 days by default
- VAT rate - This is determined by the customer's location and whether they are VAT registered
If you indicated that your business is registered for VAT in Accounting Start when you signed up, by default there will already be two contacts on the list. You'll use the HMRC Reclaimed customer contact when you reclaim VAT and the HMRC Payments supplier contact when you make VAT payments. You can change the reference for these contacts, but you cannot rename or delete them.
Create a customerFor one-off customers, or if you don't want to import them, create new customer records from Contacts. - From Contacts, choose New Customer.
- Enter the business name of the customer. This is the name you'll see on all lists when selecting this customer.
- Enter the remaining details. If you don't know all the details yet, simply enter the business name and save. You must always provide an address before saving an invoice for a customer.
 NOTE: You need to enter an address before you can save an invoice for a customer.
Refer to the sections below for setting customer defaults and storing additional information: If you're sending invoices to your customers, you must enter an address. This is the address that appears on sales invoices. If you want to email your sales documents, make sure you add an email address as well. Add the main address from the Contact Details tab. If your customer is outside the UK or Ireland, make sure your change the region just above the address and then choose the correct Country.  TIP: If you don't have any address for a customer, just use No address on the first line.
If your customer is VAT registered, enter their VAT registration number to make sure we use the correct VAT rate when entering invoices. Enter the VAT registration number from the Contact Details tab. We check the VAT number against the Country entered in the address. You cannot save the VAT number unless it has the correct format. VAT reverse charge Select VAT Reverse Charge when: We use categories to categorise or group your transactions. This is to make sure they report correctly on financial reports, such as the Profit and Loss or Balance sheet. It also helps you track your business performance and see where you're making money. Selecting the right category is critical to making sure you know where your money comes from and what you are selling. On sales invoices, you must select a category on each line to indicate what you have sold. You can use our default categories or set up your own. Set a default category on customer records to automatically select the correct category. This feature especially helps when consistently selling the same type of goods to a specific customer. From the Contact Details tab choose the default category for this customer from the Default Category drop-down. TIP: Set this in the Record and Transaction settings if you usually use the same category for all your sales. Read our Record and Transactions settings guide to find out more. Read more about categories in our chart of accounts guide > If you've agreed to credit terms with your customer, you can record them here. Set credit terms to specify the number of days an invoice can be outstanding. After setting them, the system calculates the invoice's due date based on these terms. We've set the credit terms to 30 days as this is usual for most businesses. If your credit terms are different, set them in the Record and transaction settings so they applied to all new customer records, or if this customer has unusual credit terms, enter them here. If you have bank details for any of your customers, you can store them on the Payment Details tab. They're not used anywhere and are just for your information. If you're in the CIS, make sure you set up new or existing customers as contractors, so we automatically deduct CIS from sales invoices. -
From the CIS tab, select the CIS Registered checkbox. This indicates that the contact is using the CIS scheme. -
From the Contact Details tab -
Set the Category Default to a CIS Labour ledger account
Choose the CIS category on the sales invoice to apply CIS deductions to invoice lines. Setting this as the default prevents errors and ensures accurate CIS deductions. Remember, you can only select a CIS category when choosing a CIS-registered customer. - Choose VAT Reverse Charge if the services you usually sell to this customer fall under the reverse charge rules. Read more about Reverse charge VAT and CIS
TIP: Make sure you have turned on the CIS features in the settings first. Learn about the Construction Industry Scheme (CIS). Use this space to jot down any pertinent notes about your customer. Please note that these notes do not appear on printed documents like sales invoices.
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