Billing & Invoicing
Quote vs invoice
A quote and an invoice look similar (both list line items, a total, and your business's details) but they do different jobs at different points in a sale. Sending the wrong one at the wrong time is a common, easily avoided mistake.
The short version: a quote proposes a price before you start; an invoice requests payment for what you delivered.
The key differences
| Quote | Invoice | |
|---|---|---|
| Sent | Before work starts | During or after work is delivered |
| Purpose | Propose a price for approval | Request payment that is now due |
| Key date | Valid-until date | Due date |
| Client can | Accept, decline or ask for changes | Pay, or query the charges |
| Commitment | A proposal: whether it's binding depends on your terms, acceptance and applicable law | Normally requests payment for goods or services supplied |
When to use each
Send a quote when the client hasn't committed yet: a new project, a variable scope, or any job where you want price agreement before you spend time on it. A clear valid-until date protects you: costs change, and an open-ended price is a risk you're carrying for free.
Send an invoice once work is delivered, or at agreed milestones on a longer project. Many small, well-understood jobs skip the quote step entirely and go straight to an invoice. A quote earns its place when the client genuinely needs to approve a price first.
For what actually belongs in one, see how to write a professional quotation.
Why convert an accepted quote into an invoice
Once a client accepts your quote, retyping the same business details, client details, line items, currency, discount and tax into a separate invoice is pure duplicate work, and a chance to introduce a typo that doesn't match what was agreed. Converting carries every shared field across unchanged, gives the invoice its own fresh number from the invoice generator's own numbering series, and sets today as the invoice date. The due date is deliberately left for you to set afterwards, since it's a different decision from the quote's validity window.
Try it yourself: build a quote in the quote generator, then use Convert to Invoice to hand it straight to the invoice generator. Nothing leaves your browser in the process: there's no account, and no server ever sees your details.