Record Payments and Print Checks

Your bills are approved. Now it’s time to pay the people who keep your kitchen stocked. A payment in DishBooks records money going out to a vendor and marks the bills it covers as paid, so your books and your AP aging always match what you actually owe.

You can also print the check right from DishBooks. No more handwriting checks at the end of a double.

Payments or Bill Pay?

• Payments (this article): you pay the vendor yourself. Write or print a check, send an ACH from your bank, or put it on a card, then record it here.
• Bill Pay: DishBooks mails the check for you. See Pay bills with Bill Pay.

Before you start

• The bills you’re paying are Approved. See Bills.
• The vendor is set up. To print a check, the vendor needs a mailing address. See Set up vendors.
• To print checks, your bank account has check printing turned on and a check bank account added (Step 1). You only do this once.
• You’ll need Manage on Payments (under Expenses in your role) to record payments, and Approve to approve them. Adding check bank accounts needs Payment bank accounts.

Step 1 Set up check printing (one time)

Skip this step if you only record payments you’ve already made. Check printing needs two things: printing turned on for the bank account, and the bank’s details added so DishBooks can print them on the check.

Turn on printing

1. Go to Settings → GL Accounts and find your bank account (for example, 1010 - Operating Checking). Use the search box if your list is long.
2. Open it and click Edit.
3. Turn on Enable Print Check. A Checks section opens.
4. Choose your Check Stock:
   • Full check face: DishBooks prints everything, including your company, the bank details and the MICR line, on plain blank check paper.
   • Pre-printed voucher: for the checks you already order from your bank, with your details printed on them. DishBooks fills in the payee, amount and date.
5. Enter your Next Check Number, so the numbers pick up where your checkbook left off. If you leave it blank, numbering starts at 100.
6. Click Save.

Add the bank details

1. Go to Expenses → Payments → Bank accounts and click Add bank account.
2. Fill in Bank Name, Routing Number and Account Number.
3. Add a Signature: type the signer’s name, or click Upload image to use a PNG or JPEG of a real signature (up to 1 MB).
4. Pick the GL AccountGL accountGeneral ledger account. One of the named buckets on your books, like Food Sales or Sales Tax Payable, that every dollar is sorted into. it belongs to. Only bank accounts without a check bank account yet are offered.
5. Click Add.

Got more than one bank account? Set up each one you write checks from. Each keeps its own check numbers.

Step 2 Record the payment

Every payment lives in Expenses → Payments. The Payments tab lists them all with the vendor, amount, location, the account it was paid from and how much has been applied to bills. The Payment status shows Unapplied, Partially applied or Fully applied. Fully applied means the whole payment is matched to bills.

1. Click + Create new (top right).

2. Fill in the details:

   • Location / Entity: which restaurant the payment belongs to.
   • Vendor: who you’re paying.
   • Payment number: the check number or a payment reference. It fills in for you once you pick the paid-from account, and counts up from your next check number when you add a check. You can type over it.
   • Date: the day the payment went out.
   • Payment method: how you paid. It’s free text, so type something like Check, ACH or Visa 4242.
   • Paid from GL account: the bank account or card the money came from.
   • Description: optional, for anything worth remembering.

3. Pick the bills. Once you choose the vendor, their open bills show up under Bills. Check off every bill this payment covers. The Amount adds up as you go. (The pencil next to it lets you type an amount instead.)

4. Got a copy of the check or a receipt? Drop it in Attachments.

5. Printing the check from DishBooks? Click + Add check and type a check memo (like an invoice number or account number), which prints on the check. More in Step 3.

6. Click Save (top right). The payment opens, still waiting for approval.

   

Click Approve (top right) when it looks right. Once the payment is approved, the bills you checked are marked Paid and drop off your AP aging.

One check, five invoices? Totally fine. Check off every bill the payment covers and DishBooks splits it across them. That’s exactly how your produce vendor sees it too. The bills can even be at different locations.

Already paid a stack of bills? Record them all at once

Catching up after a busy week? The Outstanding bills tab (next to Payments) lets you record lots of payments in one go.

1. Go to Expenses → Payments → Outstanding bills. You’ll see every unpaid bill with its vendor, location, the vendor’s payment method, date, due date and amount due.

2. Check off the bills you’ve already paid. Sort or filter by vendor, location or due date to find them fast.

3. Click Record payments. Pick the Date, the Paid from GL account and the Payment method, and change any Payment Number you want. Then click the Record button, which shows the count, like Record 2 payments. DishBooks creates one payment per vendor per location, each for the full amount due. They’re saved without approval, so open each one and approve it.

   

Heads up: this only records payments you’ve already made. Nothing is sent to your vendors. Want DishBooks to mail a check for you? That’s Bill Pay.

Step 3 Print the check

Clicking + Add check on a payment turns it into a check and opens a box for the check memo, the note that prints on the memo line (an invoice or account number helps your vendor match it up). Save the payment, and it opens with a Print check button (top right).

Before you print, DishBooks tells you if something’s missing:

• No bank account: the button is grayed out. Add the bank details on Payments → Bank accounts (Step 1).
• A yellow note saying the check will print without a vendor address or entity address: add it to the vendor’s profile, or to the entity, then print. Pre-printed vouchers only need the vendor address.

Click Print check and the check opens as a PDF in a new tab. Print it from there. You can print it again any time. The From name and address on a full check face come from the entity of the payment’s location.

Printing on blank stock? Use a printer that can print right to the edge, and run a test page on plain paper first to check the lines up.

Need to make a change?

Click any payment on the list to open it. You’ll see everything in one place:

• Linked bank transaction: the matching line from your bank, if the payment came through Bank activity.
• Details: location, vendor, payment number, date, payment method, paid-from account, amount, description and the date it was approved.
• Attachments: a copy of the check or receipt.
• Bills: every bill the payment covers and how much went to each. Remaining at the bottom shows anything not yet applied.

Approved payments are locked so nobody changes them by accident. To fix one, click Unapprove (top right), click Edit, make your change, then approve it again.

Lost or misprinted check? Unapprove the payment, then delete it with the trash icon (top right). Your bills go back to open. Record a new payment, with a new check number, for the replacement.

Another way to record a payment: from your bank

If your bank is connected, the payment will show up in Banking → Bank activity when it clears. You can record it right there:

1. Right-click the transaction and choose Mark as Payment.
2. Already recorded the payment? Pick it from the possible matches, so it isn’t counted twice.
3. If not, choose Create new payment. It opens filled in with the bank details. Check off the bills it covers and save.

Handy for ACH and card payments, since the bank line is your proof the money went out.

Tips and common questions

My manager paid a vendor on the spot, but we don’t know which bills it was for.

Record it anyway and leave the bills unchecked. It sits as an unapplied payment on your AP aging until you sort it out. Call the vendor, ask which invoices they applied it to, then edit the payment and check those bills. Your books stay in step with the vendor’s statement.

I paid by ACH or card. Do I still need to do this?

Yes. Recording the payment is what marks the bills paid. The fastest way is from Bank activity once it clears (see above).

Why isn’t my vendor showing up in Bill Pay?

Bill Pay only lists vendors whose payment method is set to Bill Pay. Vendors you pay yourself get their payments recorded here instead. That’s on purpose: it stops anyone from paying the same bill twice.

Can I print a check from my credit card account?

No. Check printing needs a bank account, and only bank/cash GL accounts can have one.

Where’s my check number coming from?

The Next Check Number you set on the bank’s GL account in Step 1. After that, DishBooks suggests one more than the highest check already written from that account.

What’s next

Your vendors are paid and your bills are closed out. Want DishBooks to mail checks for you instead?

Next up: Pay bills with Bill Pay