How to apply a customer remittance to a payment in Books?

TB Books · payments · Last updated September 13, 2026 · Version 1

This process works in apps: TB Books

This article will teach you how to upload the remittance a customer sent, review how it matched your open invoices, and apply the paid amounts to a customer payment.

A remittance is the document a customer sends telling you what they paid — a check stub, remittance advice, ACH / EFT payment detail, or an export from their AP portal. In Receive Payment you can upload it as a PDF or CSV instead of keying every invoice by hand. Books reads the lines (AI for PDFs and messy files), then matches them to that customer’s open invoices by your invoice number first, then their PO, work order, or reference number. Paid amounts fill the allocation grid, credits the customer deducted are applied on the credit side, and anything that did not match is listed as a variance so you can investigate before recording the cash.

Steps

• Open Sales → Payments Received (or a customer profile / invoice) and click New Payment so Receive Payment opens.
• Select the customer and location, then click Upload Remittance (AI) and choose the PDF or CSV the customer sent.
• Wait for analysis. A progress bar and estimated time remaining stay on screen while Books reads the file — keep the payment window open.
• Review Matched Books records. Each remittance line shows the Books invoice it hit, the Books balance, the amount being applied, and anything that stays open. Short pays are flagged so you can see the deduction before you accept it.
• If there are variances (no open invoice, pays more than the open balance, or an ambiguous match), click Download Variance Report and resolve those invoices before recording.
• Click Apply Remittance to Payment. Amount Received, the per-invoice amounts, payment date, check number, and payment method fill in, and every matched row is highlighted so you can see exactly what changed.
• Confirm the payment method, bank account, and date, then click Record Payment.
• Open the payment Documents section to find the original remittance file and the analysis report saved with it.

Conclusion & best practices

A short pay applies what the customer actually paid and leaves the rest open on the invoice — that is correct. Work the deduction as a claim or credit request instead of forcing the invoice closed. Books never applies more than an invoice’s open balance, so a line that pays more is always a variance worth resolving (usually a duplicate payment or an invoice already paid). Credit memos the customer deducted are applied on the credit side so Amount Received stays the true cash deposited. Keep the variance CSV with the payment so AR and the next accountant can see why a line was skipped. Reading a PDF uses one AI credit on your Books usage; a CSV with Invoice Number and Payment Amount columns is read without AI.