---
title: Creating, sending and chasing invoices
slug: creating-and-sending-invoices
category: Payments & Billing
url: https://alaga.io/help/article/creating-and-sending-invoices
audiences: business_owner, manager
updated: 2026-09-11
source: Alaga Help Center
---

# Creating, sending and chasing invoices
Sidebar: **Invoices**. The top of the page shows total invoices, awaiting payment, paid, and total revenue with the outstanding balance underneath.

## Statuses

**Draft**, **Sent**, **Paid**, **Overdue**, **Cancelled**. Clients see a Sent invoice labelled "Pending" in their portal.

## Creating one

Three routes:

- **Create Invoice** on the invoices page — pick a client, add a description, an amount, a due date and notes. This makes a single-line invoice in Draft.
- **Collect Payment** on a client's profile — lists their unpaid appointments and reservations grouped by pet, and rolls the ones you tick into one invoice. This is the right route most of the time.
- **Reservation checkout** — settling a stay produces its invoice automatically.

## Sending

A draft invoice has a **Send** button. It marks the invoice as Sent and emails it to the client. Watch the toast, because it tells you the truth:

- "Invoice sent to client" — the email went out
- "Invoice marked as sent, but the email could not be delivered" — the invoice moved on, the email did not
- "Invoice marked as sent, the client has no email on file" — add an email to the client record

If the second message appears repeatedly, check Business Settings, Email Settings, Delivery Log. See [Controlling which emails Alaga sends](/help/article/email-notification-settings).

## Getting paid

- **Pay Now** on an invoice opens a hosted payment page in a new tab for card providers that support it. If your browser blocks the popup, the toast offers an Open link.
- Clients can pay themselves from the portal, under Invoices and Payments, with a Pay button on anything unpaid.
- With a terminal-based provider, take the payment at Checkout instead.
- **Mark Paid** records payment taken outside Alaga.

Row actions also include viewing the invoice and downloading a PDF.

## Overdue and reminders

Two automations run without you:

- **Every hour**, invoices that are Sent and past their due date flip to Overdue. Due dates are evaluated in your business's own timezone.
- **Once a day**, clients with overdue invoices are emailed a reminder, oldest first. The same invoice is not chased more than once every 7 days, and clients without an email address are skipped.

## Invoice numbers

Invoices created from the invoices page or from Collect Payment are numbered sequentially per business, in the form INV-00001. Invoices generated by a package sale use an older code-based format, so they look different — that is expected, not a fault.