Creating invoices
How to create an invoice in Arvello: line items with Estonian VAT applied automatically — 24% standard, reverse charge for EU clients — and sequential numbering.
Creating an invoice takes a minute or two once your clients are in the system. You pick a client, add lines, and Arvello handles the VAT, the totals and — when you finalise — the invoice number and the accounting entries behind the scenes.
Everything here lives under Sales → Invoices. If you have not been through the invoice setup wizard yet, start with setting up your company.
Creating an invoice
Start a new invoice
Go to Sales → Invoices and select New Invoice.
Choose or create the client
Pick a client from the list, or create one on the spot without leaving the form. Choosing a client fills in their defaults — the due date comes from their payment terms (issue date plus their default number of days), and their default currency and tax code carry over. See Clients & suppliers.
Add line items
Each line has a description, quantity, unit price and tax code. Arvello picks the tax code from the client: an Estonian client gets the standard rate (24% as of 2026), an EU business with a valid VAT number gets reverse charge, and a client outside the EU gets zero-rated export. You can change the code on any line, and the VAT recalculates as you go — the full list is in VAT rates & tax codes.
Check dates and details
Confirm the issue date and due date — the due date must be on or after the issue date. Optionally add a reference or PO number, customer notes (these appear on the PDF) and internal notes (these stay between you and your team).
Save or finalise
Save Draft keeps the invoice editable. Finalise assigns the invoice number, creates the journal entries and locks the document, ready to download or send. Send Invoice does the finalising and the emailing in one go.
Invoicing in another currency works too: pick the currency on the form, and Arvello records the European Central Bank daily rate and the euro equivalent — your company's books are kept in euros.
How invoice numbers are assigned
Drafts have no number. The number is assigned at the moment you finalise, by combining your invoice prefix with the next number in your sequence — with the default settings that produces INV-000001, INV-000002 and so on. Because numbering happens at finalisation, deleting a draft never leaves a gap in the sequence.
You chose the prefix and starting number during the invoice setup wizard; both can be changed at any time in company settings.
Drafts versus sent invoices
What you can do with an invoice depends entirely on its status.
| Status | What it means | What you can do |
|---|---|---|
| Draft | Not yet finalised, no number | Edit anything, delete |
| Sent | Finalised: number assigned, entries posted | Resend, cancel (while unpaid), duplicate |
| Partial | Sent, with part of the total paid | Same as Sent, except cancelling |
| Overdue | Sent and past its due date | Same as Sent |
| Paid | Fully paid | Duplicate, regenerate the PDF |
| Cancelled | Cancelled: journal entries reversed | View only |
A finalised invoice cannot be edited, because it has accounting entries behind it. If something is wrong, cancel it (possible while no payment is recorded — cancelling reverses the entries) and issue a corrected one. If only your company or contact details have changed, Regenerate PDF rebuilds the document while the amounts stay put.
⚠️Finalising is one-way
Once finalised, an invoice can only be cancelled or duplicated, never edited. Worth a glance over the details before confirming.
Duplicating an invoice
Duplicate on any invoice creates a fresh draft with the same client, lines and notes. The issue date becomes today, the due date keeps the same payment-terms gap as the original, and the reference field is cleared. Handy for near-identical jobs; for genuinely regular billing, recurring invoices save you the clicking.
Common questions
A line has the wrong VAT rate
While the invoice is a draft, change the tax code on that line and the VAT recalculates immediately. The default comes from the client's country and VAT number, so if the wrong rate keeps appearing, check those fields on the contact. If the invoice is already finalised and unpaid, cancel it and issue a corrected one. Each code, and where it reports on the KMD (the Estonian VAT return), is in VAT rates & tax codes.
I want to change the numbering
The invoice prefix and the next sequence number live in company settings. Changes apply to invoices finalised from that point on; existing numbers stay as they are. If you moved to Arvello from other software, set the next number to continue from your last invoice.
Key Takeaways
- 1Drafts are free to edit and delete; finalising assigns the number and locks the invoice
- 2VAT is applied per line, with the default code chosen from the client's country and VAT status
- 3Invoice numbers combine your prefix with a sequence — both changeable in company settings
- 4Duplicate creates a fresh draft with today's date and the same payment terms