Fill in your invoice
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What are you charging for?
| Description | Qty | Price | Amount |
|---|
What has to be on an invoice
The list is shorter than most people expect, and it is not the same for everyone. Three of the lines below depend on what your business is, and that is the part a template off the internet usually gets wrong.
| On every invoice | What it means in practice |
|---|---|
| A unique identifying number | One run, no gaps. It is the first thing anyone checks, and it is what your customer quotes when they pay. |
| Your business name, address and contact details | An address that reaches you, not just a mobile number. |
| Your customer's name and address | And the site address as well when the work was not at their own address. |
| A clear description of what you are charging for | Clear enough that someone who was not there can tell what was done. |
| The date of supply and the invoice date | Both, even when they are the same day. The date of supply is when the work was done. |
| The amount being charged and the total owed | Per line, then the total. |
If you are a sole trader
Your own name goes on it, plus any business name you trade under. Trading under a business name also means giving an address where legal documents can be served on you — that is the point of the address, not decoration. You do not have a company number, and an invoice without one is complete. If a template tells you otherwise, the template was written for a limited company.
If you are a limited company
The full company name as it appears on the certificate of incorporation. And one rule that catches people out: if you name any of your directors on the invoice, you have to name all of them. Naming one is the mistake; naming none is fine.
VAT: three rates, and the invoice changes shape when you are registered
You have to register for VAT once your turnover passes £90,000 over any twelve months. Below that you can register voluntarily, and plenty of trades do because it lets them reclaim VAT on materials.
Whether you are registered changes what the invoice is:
- Not registered. You charge no VAT and you put no VAT number on the invoice. Tick I am not registered for VAT above and the tool leaves both off and says so on the document. Putting a VAT line on an invoice when you are not registered is not a formatting slip — it is charging tax you are not entitled to collect.
- Registered. The invoice becomes a VAT invoice, and it needs your VAT registration number, the rate per line, the amount of VAT and the total including VAT. That is what lets your customer reclaim it.
The rates that matter for installation work: 20% standard, 5% reduced, and 0% on qualifying energy saving materials installed in a residential property. That zero rate is not permanent — it runs to 31 March 2027 and then reverts to 5%. Which rate applies is a question about the work, not about the customer; the guide on VAT for energy saving materials works through the cases.
Working for a contractor? The reverse charge is probably yours
If you are VAT registered, your customer is VAT registered, and the work is reported under the Construction Industry Scheme, then the domestic reverse charge applies. You do not charge the VAT. Your customer accounts for it instead.
HMRC does not prescribe the words, but the invoice has to make clear that the reverse charge applies and that the customer has to account for the VAT, and it has to state the amount of VAT they are accounting for — without including it in the VAT you have charged, because you have charged none. Tick Reverse charge above and the tool puts that line on the document.
The trap is that it looks like a mistake. An invoice with a zero VAT total and a full description of chargeable work reads like something went wrong, and it has not. What the reverse charge does to your cash flow is the part worth reading before your first one, because the VAT you used to hold on to for a quarter stops arriving.
Getting paid late — and the rule that does not apply to householders
Between businesses you can charge statutory interest of 8% above the Bank of England base rate on a late payment, plus a fixed sum towards the cost of chasing it:
| Debt | Fixed sum you can add |
|---|---|
| Up to £999.99 | £40 |
| £1,000 to £9,999.99 | £70 |
| £10,000 or more | £100 |
None of that applies when your customer is a householder. The Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 only covers a contract where the buyer and the seller are each acting in the course of a business (section 2). Most of our customers spend most of their week invoicing people who are not. Putting “statutory interest and a £40 charge apply” at the bottom of an invoice to a homeowner is a threat you cannot carry out, and it is the sort of line that gets copied from a contractor invoice to a domestic one without anybody rereading it.
What does work on a domestic invoice is a clear due date and asking on the day it passes. Getting paid faster is about the ordinary version of that.
Sort code and account number, not IBAN
The tool asks for a sort code and an account number because that is what a UK customer will type into their banking app. An IBAN is not wrong, it is just not what anyone here recognises, and an unfamiliar string of characters on a payment line is a reason to leave it until later.
Everything stays in your browser
Nothing you type goes to a server. Your own business details are remembered locally so the next invoice takes half a minute, and you can clear them by clearing your browser data. There is no account and no email address, and the PDF is the print dialogue — choose Save as PDF as the destination.
Frequently asked questions
What has to be on an invoice in the UK?
A unique identifying number, your business name and address, your customer's name and address, a clear description of what you are charging for, the date of supply and the invoice date, the amounts and the total. A sole trader also puts their own name on it and, if they trade under a business name, an address where legal documents can be served. A limited company puts the full company name as it appears on the certificate of incorporation. If you are VAT registered, add your VAT registration number, the rate per line, the VAT amount and the total including VAT.
Do I need a VAT number on my invoice?
Only if you are registered for VAT. Registration is compulsory once your turnover passes £90,000 over any twelve months, and voluntary below that. If you are not registered you charge no VAT and put no VAT number on the invoice — that is a complete invoice, not an incomplete one.
Do I need a company number?
Only if you are a limited company. A sole trader does not have one and does not need one. Templates that insist on a company number were written for companies.
What does the invoice say when the reverse charge applies?
That the domestic reverse charge applies and that the customer has to account for the VAT, plus the amount of VAT they are accounting for — shown separately and not added into the VAT you have charged, because you have charged none. HMRC does not prescribe the wording; it does require the reference to be there. Tick ‘Reverse charge’ in the tool and it goes on.
Can I charge interest if my customer pays late?
Between businesses, yes: 8% above the Bank of England base rate, plus a fixed sum of £40, £70 or £100 depending on the size of the debt. Against a householder, no — the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 only applies where both parties are acting in the course of a business.
Is it really free, and where does my data go?
Free, with no account and no email address. Everything you type stays in your own browser and nothing is sent to a server. Your own business details are stored locally so the next invoice is quicker; clearing your browser data clears them.
What if the invoice wrote itself?
In Quandron the invoice comes out of the job — the hours, the materials and the photos are already there, the numbering runs on its own, and the reminders go out on the dates you set once. You stop having to remember which ones are still out.
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