LoopfourMatch payments to invoices
Set up cash application: match incoming payments to open invoices, post the matches to your ledger, and send unmatched payments to a person.
The job
Payments land through the day. Someone looks up each one, finds the open invoice it pays, and applies it in the ledger. Payments with a missing reference or a short amount sit in a spreadsheet until someone chases them.
By hand
With Loopfour
How the workflow runs
- TriggerSix times a dayThe template runs on a schedule, once each four hours. You can change it.
- StepCollect recent Stripe paymentsSuccessful payments from the last few hours.
- StepMatch payments to open invoicesThe AI Agent step uses customer, amount and memo to find the likely invoice.
- DecisionMatched?Matched payments are posted. The rest go to a person.
- OutputPost matched paymentsTo NetSuite, QuickBooks or Sage Intacct, whichever you choose.
- StepUnmatched payments go to a personA message in Slack, Gmail or Outlook lists the payments that need review.
What you need
- Template: Cash application, in the AR area of Workflows > Templates.
- Systems to connect: Stripe for payments; NetSuite, QuickBooks or Sage Intacct for invoices and posting; Slack, Gmail or Outlook for the review message.
- Who reviews: the AR team member who works the unmatched list. If you want sign-off before posting, name an approver too.
Set it up
Open the template
Go to Workflows, open the Templates tab and choose AR. Select Cash application.
Choose your systems
In the Recipe view, choose where invoices are matched and posted, and where unmatched payments are sent. When you change a system, Studio asks to save your own copy of the template. Select Duplicate & edit.
Create the workflow
Select Flow to check the steps, then Run workflow. Studio opens chat, checks your connections and asks for any settings it needs, such as the review channel, before it creates your workflow.
Add sign-off before posting, if you want it
The template posts matches without a pause. To check them first, ask chat to add an Approval step before the posting step. See Add an approval step.
Deploy, then test
Add the approval before testing so matches are not posted without review. Select Deploy, then Run. Compare the proposed matches with your ledger and reject the test approval if you do not want to post them. See Deploy, test and change a workflow.
Run works only when the workflow is Active. Deploying also switches on its trigger; choose a safe schedule or test source before deploying. Runs make real changes in connected systems.
With QuickBooks, the template's posting step records the first matched payment in each run. If you expect several payments per run, ask chat to repeat the posting step for each match. See Repeat for each item.
What you review
- Unmatched payments: the review message lists how many payments need a person. Work them in your ledger as you do today.
- Each run: under Runs, each run shows the payments collected, the matches the AI Agent step proposed and what was posted. Check the proposed matches closely on the first few runs. See Read a run.
- Approvals and changes: if you added an approval, decisions are under Approvals. The Audit trail tab under Runs records workflow changes and approval decisions made in Studio. Decisions from email or Slack are kept on the run.
Adapt it
- Run it less often: change the schedule to once a day, before your AR team starts. See Run a workflow on a schedule.
- Send exceptions by email: choose Gmail or Outlook instead of Slack for the review message.
- Keep a log: add a step that writes each match to a table, so you can build an applied-cash view. See Tables.
Set up a new customer across your systems
Build a workflow that creates matching customer records in your ledger and billing system when a new company is added to your CRM.
Follow up on overdue invoices
Set up a workflow that emails customers about overdue invoices, with firmer reminders as an invoice ages and a weekly aging summary for your controller.