12.2 Billable Time and Expenses
Key Takeaways
Bill Costs to Customers is enabled at Setup > Company > Enable Features, on the Transactions subtab.
Copy Time Memos to Invoices is an accounting preference. It copies memos from billable time onto invoices when Bill Costs to Customers is in use.
The memo preference lives under Accounting Preferences on the Time & Expenses subtab. It is not a personal Set Preferences choice.
Billable time, billable expenses, and billable items appear on separate invoice subtabs: Billable Time, Billable Expenses, and Billable Items.
Copy Expense Memos to Invoices is a separate accounting preference for expense memos. It does not copy time memos.
From a cost you paid to a line the customer can be billed
Hours and costs often hit the books before the customer is invoiced. Mark the time, item, or expense as billable, name the customer, and use Bill Costs to Customers to pull the checked lines onto an invoice or cash sale.
Two setups are easy to mix up, and they live in different places. The feature that allows billing is an Enable Features checkbox. The choice that copies a time memo onto the invoice is an accounting preference. Neither one is a personal preference under Home > Set Preferences.
Turn on Bill Costs to Customers
An administrator enables the feature at Setup > Company > Enable Features. On the Transactions subtab, check Bill Costs to Customers, then save. Until that box is checked, the invoice does not offer the billable subtabs this section describes.
Time entry also needs Time Tracking enabled, on the Employees subtab of Enable Features, before employees can record hours. Purchase transactions that will carry billable items or expenses need the normal purchasing features those transactions use. Enabling the billing feature does not, by itself, mark any existing line as billable. Someone still checks Billable and selects the customer on the source transaction.
Related accounting preferences can check Billable for you. Expenses Billable by Default and Items Billable by Default sit on Accounting Preferences, Time & Expenses, and they depend on Bill Costs to Customers. They default the Billable box when you select a customer. They do not copy memos, and they do not replace the Enable Features checkbox.
Mark the source line, then invoice it
Help describes one sequence for time, items, and expenses:
- Enter the time, the item, or the expense.
- Check Billable.
- Assign the customer who should be billed.
- Create an invoice or cash sale for that customer.
- Open the matching billable subtab and check the lines to include. Mark All and Unmark All select or clear every line on that subtab.
The source can be a time transaction, a purchase order, a vendor bill, a check, or a credit card charge. If the billable item was entered on a purchase order, bill that purchase order before you bill the customer for the item. The customer invoice is a second step. It does not replace the vendor bill.
Invoice Billable Customers can bill many customers at once, filtered by Expenses, Items, or Time. With Multiple Currencies, those invoices are created only in each customer's primary currency.
Time tracking into Billable Time
On a time entry, select the customer or project, select the service item, and check Billable when those hours should be invoiced. If a customer or project is selected, a service item is required. After Bill Costs to Customers is on, that time appears on the Billable Time subtab when you invoice the customer.
The Billable box is disabled when the project has no customer or the project task is non-billable. Time-and-materials and charge-based projects default the line to billable. Fixed-bid interval and fixed-bid milestone projects default it to not billable.
Override Rates on Time Records is a separate accounting preference. When it is checked, you can change the billable rate on the time entry, and with Multiple Prices you can pick a price level there. When it is clear, the service item bills at the customer's current item rate.
Copy Time Memos to Invoices
The memo on a time record is optional text, such as a note about the work performed. It reaches the invoice only when an accounting preference says so. Go to Setup > Accounting > Preferences > Accounting Preferences, open the Time & Expenses subtab, and check Copy Time Memos to Invoices. Help's description is direct: check the box to have invoices include memos entered on billable time, and clear it to leave the memo field empty. Turning the preference on also copies memos already stored on existing time records onto invoices you create afterward.
This preference requires Bill Costs to Customers. It does not enable billing. Billing is the feature. The preference only carries the memo text. It is not stored under a user's personal Set Preferences page, so a consultant cannot turn it on for one login and leave everyone else unchanged.
Copy Service Item Description to Time Memo copies the service item description into the memo on the time transaction. It fills the time record. It does not, by itself, copy that memo onto the invoice.
The October 2024 foundation sample identifies Copy Time Memos to Invoices as the preference that lets invoices include memos from time records when Bill Costs to Customers is enabled. Expense memos are a different box, described next.
Expenses and billable items
Enter an expense on a vendor bill, check, credit card charge, or expense line. Check Billable and select the customer. The same pattern applies to an item you bought for the customer. When you invoice that customer, expenses are listed on the Billable Expenses subtab and items are listed on the Billable Items subtab. You check the lines you want. Unchecked lines stay available for a later invoice.
Copy Expense Memos to Invoices is the accounting preference for memos typed on billable expenses. It is on the same Time & Expenses subtab. Check it, save, and expense memos already entered on existing expense records show on invoices you create. It does not copy time memos. Time stays on Copy Time Memos to Invoices. Using the expense preference for a time question swaps the source record.
Markup is visible in two different ways. The customer sees a selling price that includes the markup spread over the expense items. When you view the invoice or cash sale inside NetSuite, you can see the markup as its own entry. Do not expect the printed customer total to list that markup as a second line the way the internal view does.
What each source puts on the invoice
| Source | What you mark | Invoice subtab | What the invoice can show |
|---|---|---|---|
| Time | Time Tracking entry, customer or project selected, Billable checked, service item required | Billable Time | The service line for those hours. The time memo is included when Copy Time Memos to Invoices is checked |
| Expense | Expense on a bill, check, credit card, or expense report line, Billable checked, customer assigned | Billable Expenses | The expense at the selling price. Copy Expense Memos to Invoices carries the expense memo. Markup can appear as its own entry in the NetSuite view |
| Billable item | Item marked billable on a purchase order, bill, check, or credit card, with a customer | Billable Items | The item line. If the item started on a purchase order, bill the purchase order before billing the customer |
A consulting day, end to end
A consultant records 3 hours for Northwind, selects the consulting service item, checks Billable, and types the memo Server cutover. The same day, a $40 parking charge is entered on a credit card transaction, marked billable, and assigned to Northwind, with its own memo.
On Northwind's invoice, the hours sit on Billable Time and the parking sits on Billable Expenses. Check both lines to include them. Copy Time Memos to Invoices can carry Server cutover onto the invoice. The parking memo follows only if Copy Expense Memos to Invoices is checked. Clearing the time preference leaves the time memo off the invoice even though the hours stay billable. Both memo boxes are accounting preferences, not a personal Set Preferences option.
Bill Costs to Customers is enabled. Which accounting preference lets invoices include memos entered on billable time records?
Copy Source Memos
Copy All Memos
Copy Expense Memos to Invoices
Copy Time Memos to Invoices
Where does an administrator enable Bill Costs to Customers?
Home > Set Preferences, on the personal transactions page
Setup > Company > Enable Features, on the Transactions subtab
The invoice printing preference that shows memos
The employee record, in the purchase limit field
A time entry is marked billable, a customer is selected, and Bill Costs to Customers is on. Where do those hours appear when you invoice the customer?
On the Billable Time subtab of the invoice or cash sale
Only on the vendor bill that pays the employee
On the item receipt for the purchase order
On the Billable Expenses subtab, because time is stored as an expense
Sections you finish are checked off in the contents.