For kitchen & bathroom fitters

Invoicing for kitchen and bathroom fitters

You buy the kitchen before you fit it: carcases, worktops, and an appliance package ordered weeks ahead, then a fortnight on site with the client living around the dust. Take the deposit that pays for the order, set the rest of the stages once on the same invoice, and Sendinvo chases whichever stage is due while you get on with the fit. When the spec moves, a credit note takes the line off at the price it went on.

30 days of everything, free. No card needed.

The shape of a fit

From the accepted quote to the last bead of silicone

Quote accepted

The client accepts a priced quote on their phone, whether the work came to you direct or through a kitchen studio. Convert it and the invoice opens with the same lines and prices, ready for you to stage up.

Deposit on order

Carcases, doors, worktops, and appliances are bought long before day one. The deposit is the first stage of the payment plan, with its own due date, so it lands before the order goes in.

Strip-out and first fix

Old units out, waste and pipework moved, cables pulled. The next stage falls due on its own date and the client settles that stage alone, by card once you connect Stripe or by bank transfer to the sort code and account number on the invoice.

Variations

The client drops the boiling-water tap, or decides to supply the appliances themselves. A credit note takes that line off at the price and VAT rate it was billed at, and the balance still due moves to match.

Completion

The last stage is chased for you on the dates you set. If a kitchen studio or a letting agent runs over on a sterling invoice, one click drafts a separate statutory interest invoice for you to read before it goes.

Built for a supply-and-fit job

The order, the rates, and the changes of mind

The deposit pays for the order, the balance follows the fit

The money goes out before the work starts. While the invoice is still a draft, split it into the stages the job actually runs to: deposit on order, strip-out and first fix, units and worktops in, completion. Each stage takes its own amount and its own due date, and they have to add up to the invoice total. Once you send it the schedule is fixed, it prints on the PDF the client keeps, and Sendinvo chases the stage that is due rather than the whole kitchen. See deposits and payment plans.

One job, more than one VAT rate

A kitchen in the main house and a shower room in the annexe can end up on the same invoice at different rates. Tick “Set VAT per line” and every line carries the rate you give it: 0%, 5%, or 20%. Sendinvo groups the lines by rate, totals each band on its own, and the subtotal, the VAT, and the total still agree to the penny. It doesn’t pick the rate for you, and which rate a line should take is a question for you and your accountant. See per-line VAT.

Variations, credited at the price they went on

Specs move once the room is open and the client can see it. The tap they chose in the showroom comes back out, or they buy the fridge freezer themselves in the sale. Tick the line that came off and a credit note credits it at the price and VAT rate it was billed at, then nets that value off the balance still due. Nobody has to read a reissued invoice line by line to find what changed.

The paperwork a new kitchen comes with

Appliance warranties, the manuals, the certificate for the new circuit, before-and-after photos of the room. Add your standing files once and every invoice email carries them, or attach the ones a single job produced. One email carries up to 10 files and 10 MB across everything in it, the invoice PDF included. They ride the email rather than the invoice, so what the client files is a clean invoice. See email attachments.

Bathrooms on site, under CIS

Fitting out plots for a main contractor is a different invoice from a homeowner’s. Set your rate once, 20%, 30%, or 0% for gross payment status, tick the deduction, and enter the labour figure: it comes off the labour alone, so the suite, the tiles, and the brassware keep their full value. If you are both VAT registered, tick the domestic reverse charge alongside it and the wording HMRC expects prints on the document. See CIS invoices. A CIS invoice can’t carry a deposit or a payment plan, so keep those for the kitchens and bathrooms you invoice direct.

The studio account and the letting agent

Trade clients bill differently from a homeowner. A kitchen studio’s accounts team wants the whole account rather than one invoice at a time, so send them a client statement: every issued invoice for that client, its status, total, and outstanding balance, plus the total still owed, on one A4 page in your own branding. A letting agent on a monthly maintenance account goes on a recurring schedule, raised and emailed on the same date every month.

See it in action

A fitting business, seeded and running

The real app, filled with a fitter’s month: a full kitchen half paid on a four-stage plan, a bathroom refit with the deposit in and first fix next, a kitchen studio’s fitting labour still out, a letting agent’s maintenance account on a recurring schedule, and a credit note for the integrated microwave a client left off the order. Have a click around.

sendinvo.com/invoices

A live demo seeded with a fitting business. Nothing you do here is saved or sent.

Worked examples

What a fit looks like on the invoice

One payment plan on one invoice, four stages tied to the weeks on site.

Payment plan for a full kitchen supply and fit
Deposit on order £13,200.00 Paid
Strip-out and first fix £4,500.00 Next due
Units and worktops in £5,500.00
Completion £4,100.00
Total £27,300.00

The deposit falls due before the order goes in, so the units go on order against the client’s money rather than your own overdraft. Each later stage is chased on its own date and the client settles that stage alone. Above £10,000 a stage goes on the card, because Stripe caps instant bank payment there.

The same fitter, a week later: a kitchen in the main house and a shower room in the annexe, on one invoice at two rates.

Per-line VAT on a house and its annexe
Kitchen supply and fit, main house, VAT 20% £9,400.00
Shower room, the annexe, VAT 5% £3,600.00
Subtotal £13,000.00
VAT 5% on £3,600.00 £180.00
VAT 20% on £9,400.00 £1,880.00
Total £15,060.00

Each band is totalled on its own, lowest rate first, and the total agrees with the lines above it. You set the rate every line carries. Sendinvo does the arithmetic.

And the one that lands after the invoice has gone: the client takes the heated towel rail out of the bathroom.

Credit note against a bathroom refit already invoiced
Invoice INV-0112, bathroom refit £12,720.00
Credit note CN-0004, heated towel rail −£340.00
VAT credited at 20% −£68.00
Balance still due on INV-0112 £12,312.00

The rail is credited at the price and rate it was billed at, so the balance moves by exactly £408.00 and the invoice the client already has stays as it went out.

Questions

Good to know

Can I take the deposit before I order the units?

Yes. While the invoice is still a draft, split it into a payment plan and the deposit becomes the first stage, with its own amount and its own due date, so it falls due before the order goes in. Sendinvo chases that stage until it is paid, then moves to the next one.

Can the client pay each stage as the work goes on?

Yes. Each stage falls due on its own date and your client settles that stage alone: by transfer to the sort code and account number printed on the invoice, by card once you connect a Stripe account, or by instant bank payment on a sterling invoice up to £10,000. Stripe charges its own processing fees on the payments it handles.

Can one invoice carry more than one VAT rate?

Yes. Tick “Set VAT per line” on a sterling invoice and every line takes the rate you give it, 0%, 5%, or 20%. Sendinvo groups the lines by rate, totals each band on its own, and keeps the subtotal, the VAT, and the total agreeing to the penny. Which rate a line should carry is a question for you and your accountant, not something Sendinvo decides.

The client dropped an appliance after I had invoiced. How do I take it off?

Issue a credit note against that invoice and tick the line that came out. It credits at the price and the VAT rate it was billed at, and its value nets off the balance still due, so the client reads a reduction rather than a reissued invoice. If the credit clears what is left, the invoice settles to paid and its reminders stop.

Can I send photos of the finished room with the invoice?

Yes, on the invoice email rather than on the invoice itself. Photos straight off your phone, a short walkthrough video, the appliance warranties, and the certificate for the new circuit all arrive in the same message as the invoice PDF, up to 10 files and 10 MB across everything the email carries.

I fit bathrooms on a housing site for a main contractor. Does Sendinvo work out the CIS deduction?

Yes. Set your rate once in company settings, 20%, 30%, or 0% for gross payment status, then tick “Apply CIS deduction” on a sterling invoice and enter the labour figure. On £4,200.00 of labour and £3,100.00 of suite, tiles, and brassware, a 20% deduction takes £840.00 off the labour alone, so the invoice shows a £7,300.00 total and £6,460.00 due. When the main contractor pays that net amount, the invoice settles in full.

I look after a letting agent’s kitchens and bathrooms every month. Can that invoice repeat?

Yes. Put the client on a recurring schedule and Sendinvo raises and emails the same invoice on the same date each month, with your lines and VAT rate already on it. Recurring invoices send themselves, so there is no draft waiting for your approval, and you can pause the schedule when the contract ends.

Order the units with the deposit already in.

30 days of everything, free. No card needed. After that it’s £20 a month for one person, plus £5 for each extra person on the account.