Customer Prepayments Overview

GoldFinch Customer Prepayments helps organizations record and manage payments received before shipping goods or completing services.

Built natively on Salesforce, GoldFinch connects customer prepayments with sales orders, invoices, receivables, bank activity, and accounting records. This provides visibility into the amount received, how it has been applied, and any balance remaining.

What Is a Customer Prepayment?

A customer prepayment is money received before the related sale has been fully earned or invoiced. It may also be described as a customer deposit, advance payment, or payment on account.

Customer prepayments are commonly used for:

• Custom or made-to-order products
• Large or high-value orders
• Special-order items
• New customers without established credit
• Orders requiring payment before shipment
• Long production or delivery cycles
• Contractual deposits
• Subscription or service arrangements billed in advance

Accounting treatment depends on the transaction's nature and the organization’s accounting policies.

A Connected Prepayment Process

GoldFinch can support a connected workflow:

1. Record the customer’s sales order or other commitment.
2. Determine the required deposit or advance-payment amount.
3. Receive and record the customer’s payment.
4. Connect the prepayment with the appropriate customer or transaction.
5. Fulfill the order and create the sales invoice.
6. Apply the prepayment to the invoice.
7. Collect, refund, or otherwise resolve any remaining balance.
8. Maintain the related accounting and audit history.

The specific process depends on the GoldFinch modules and configuration each organization selects.

Centralized Payment Information

A customer prepayment record can include information such as:

• Customer
• Related sales order
• Payment date
• Payment amount
• Payment method
• Bank or clearing account
• Customer reference
• Currency
• Amount applied
• Unapplied balance
• Related sales invoice
• Notes and supporting information

Keeping this information connected helps customer service and accounting teams understand an order's financial status.

Prepayment Requirements

Organizations may require different types of advance payment, including:

• A fixed deposit amount
• A percentage of the order value
• Full payment before fulfillment
• Payments tied to project or production milestones
• Multiple deposits received over time

GoldFinch provides the transaction foundation for managing these arrangements. Organizations can set approval requirements and operating procedures based on their policies.

Application to Customer Invoices

After the related goods or services are invoiced, an authorized user can apply the available prepayment to the customer invoice.

For example, if a customer prepays $2,000 toward a $5,000 order, the $2,000 may be applied when the sales invoice is created, leaving $3,000 to be collected.

Connecting the payment, sales order, and invoice helps provide a clear view of:

• The original customer commitment
• Payments received
• Amounts applied
• Remaining prepayments
• Outstanding invoice balances

Partial and Multiple Prepayments

GoldFinch can support situations in which:

• A customer makes several deposits toward one order.
• One prepayment is partially applied.
• An order is fulfilled and invoiced in stages.
• Additional payment is required before shipping the remaining products.
• A payment remains unapplied until you create the appropriate invoice.

This flexibility can help with long-term, high-value, or milestone-based transactions.

Unapplied Prepayments

A prepayment may remain unapplied when the related invoice has not yet been created or when the customer has paid more than the invoiced amount.

Authorized users can review unapplied balances and determine whether they should be:

• Applied to a future invoice
• Retained for an open order
• Transferred according to company policy
• Refunded to the customer

Organizations should periodically review unapplied amounts to ensure they remain accurate and properly supported.

Refunds and Cancellations

If an order is reduced or canceled, some or all of the customer’s prepayment may need to be refunded or reassigned. GoldFinch can help maintain the connection among the original payment, customer, order, application, and resulting financial activity.

Refunds should follow the organization’s approval, payment-security, and accounting policies.

Accounting Treatment

Depending on the circumstances, a customer prepayment may be recorded as a liability until the related goods are delivered or services are earned. It generally should not be recognized immediately as revenue solely because cash has been received.

When you use GoldFinch Accounting, customer prepayments, invoices, receivables, bank transactions, and general ledger entries can remain connected within Salesforce.

Organizations should determine the appropriate accounting treatment based on their policies, contracts, and applicable accounting requirements.

Payment Methods and Integrations

Depending on the selected GoldFinch capabilities and integrations, customer prepayments may originate from methods such as:

• ACH or electronic bank transfer
• Credit card
• Check
• Wire transfer
• Customer portal
• Supported payment-service integrations

Payment processing services may require separate subscriptions, transaction fees, setup, or professional services.

Visibility Across Teams

Connected prepayment information can help:

• Sales teams confirm whether payment requirements are met.
• Customer service teams answer questions about deposits and balances.
• Operations teams determine whether an order can proceed.
• Warehouse teams confirm whether payment-dependent orders may be released.
• Accounting teams apply payments, reconcile bank activity, and manage liabilities.
• Management monitors prepayment balances and related customer commitments.

Control access to payment and accounting information through the organization’s Salesforce security settings.

Reporting and Reconciliation

Salesforce reports, dashboards, and list views can help authorized users monitor:

• Prepayments received
• Applied and unapplied amounts
• Prepayments by customer
• Deposits related to open sales orders
• Orders awaiting required payment
• Prepayments awaiting invoice creation
• Long-outstanding unapplied balances
• Refunds and canceled orders
• Prepayments by currency or payment method
• Exceptions requiring review

These tools can support timely application, reconciliation, and follow-up.

Business Benefits

GoldFinch Customer Prepayments helps organizations:

• Track advance payments and customer deposits.
• Connect payments with customer orders and invoices.
• Improve visibility into payment-dependent orders.
• Reduce reliance on spreadsheets and manual tracking.
• Monitor applied and unapplied balances.
• Support partial and multiple deposits.
• Coordinate sales, operations, fulfillment, and accounting.
• Maintain a clearer audit trail.
• Improve bank and customer-account reconciliation.
• Manage customer payment information on Salesforce.

Learn More

GoldFinch customers can sign in to access detailed instructions for recording, applying, reconciling, and refunding customer prepayments.

To learn how GoldFinch can support your organization’s prepayment and deposit processes, please contact GoldFinch Cloud Solutions.