Record deal payments
Record deposits and payments on a deal, watch balance due drop, refund or void a line, and read the ledger. Double-click safe so retries never post twice.
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Track the money on a deal. Record each deposit and payment, watch the balance go down, and void a mistake. Payments are double-click safe, so a retry never posts twice.
Where it lives
The Payments card sits on the deal's first step, Deal info. Open any deal and scroll down. Payments is near the bottom of that step, below the Money summary, trade-in, F&I products, and (on finance deals) the finance terms.
The Money summary at the top of the step also shows two running totals you can trust at a glance:
- Collected: everything paid so far (voided payments excluded).
- Balance due: the deal total minus what's collected.
Record a payment
- Open the deal and find the Payments card.
- Click Record payment.
- Pick the Type: Deposit, Down payment, Trade equity applied, Wire received, Cash at signing, Refund, or Other.
- Pick the Method: Cash, Check, Card, Wire, ACH, Money order, or Internal credit.
- Enter the Amount (e.g.
1000or1000.00). - Optionally add a Reference (check #, wire confirmation, etc.) and Notes.
- Click Record. The ledger, Total paid, and Balance due update right away.
Each payment is its own line. Take a $500 deposit today and the $9,500 balance at signing? Record two payments; don't overwrite the first.
Recording is double-click safe. If you click Record twice, or the page hiccups and you resubmit, the same payment is not posted twice. The system reuses one key per payment and returns the original. The key resets only after a successful save, so the next payment you record is counted separately.
Record a refund
A payment taken through Stripe is refunded in the Stripe Dashboard, and the refund records itself on the deal, so don't record it here too. For any other payment, record a payment with Type = Refund to give money back. Enter the refund as a normal positive Amount; the system stores it as a negative so it subtracts from the ledger and lowers Total paid.
Every role can record a payment or a deposit. A refund is for owners, admin managers and accounting. Sales cannot record one.
Only Refund-type payments can be negative. Every other type must be positive. If you try to give a non-refund payment a negative amount, it's rejected.
Take a payment with Stripe
On the Max plan, with Stripe connected under Settings, Customer payments, the Take a payment with Stripe card on the deal takes a deposit, down payment or balance by card or bank account through your own Stripe account. The money goes straight to your bank.
- Pick what the payment is for and enter the amount (up to the balance due, and at most $99,000 in one payment).
- Click Open payment page to pay at the desk (the page lasts an hour), or Email link to send the buyer a link that lasts a day.
- When Stripe confirms the payment, it records itself on the deal as Card (Stripe) or Bank account (Stripe). A bank payment shows Bank payment clearing until the bank confirms it.
Money already on its way counts against the balance: while a payment page is open or a bank payment is clearing, neither a second page nor a hand-entered payment can ask for the same money again. To take that money another way, click Cancel link next to the open page first. The pages already sent stay on the card, with Cancel link, even when new Stripe payments are not available.
A payment taken through Stripe is never voided here. Refund it in your Stripe Dashboard: each refund records itself on the deal once Stripe finishes it (a part refund too; a bank refund can take a few days), and so does a bank return or a lost card dispute. If a refund fails in Stripe, it comes back off the deal by itself. Its row shows Refund in Stripe where other rows show Void.
Read the ledger
Each recorded payment shows as a row with: Date, Type, Method, Amount, Reference, and Status (Active or Voided). Voided rows are struck through and don't count toward your totals.
Void a payment
Made a mistake? Void it. Voiding leaves the row in the ledger (struck through, marked Voided) for the audit trail, and removes it from Total paid and Balance due.
- In the Payments ledger, find the payment row.
- Click Void on the right of that row.
- Type a reason when prompted (required; an empty reason cancels the void), then confirm.
Only Owners and Admin managers can void a payment. Sales and Accounting see the ledger and the note "Only owners and admin/managers can void payments," but no Void button. Voiding is permanent: there's no un-void, and an already-voided payment can't be voided again. To correct a wrong amount: void the bad payment and record a fresh, correct one.
FAQ
Do I need to record payments to mark a deal sold?
No. Payments and the sale status are separate. You can mark a deal sold with a balance still due, and you can record payments before or after the sale (receivables post after the sale by design). The Payments ledger is your record of money in (and out) on the deal.
Are these payments charged to a card or pulled from a bank?
It depends how the payment was taken. On the Max plan, with your own Stripe account connected, Take a payment with Stripe on the deal takes a deposit, down payment or balance by card or bank account. That payment records itself on this ledger, with the method Card (Stripe) or Bank account (Stripe), when Stripe confirms it, and the money goes straight to your bank. A refund you give in the Stripe Dashboard records itself here too. See Take payments with Stripe.
Record payment is for money taken anywhere else (cash, check, wire, a card machine or a bank transfer you already have). There, the methods Card and ACH mean a payment taken outside AutoDealer.io, and recording it charges nothing.
Why does my refund show as a negative amount?
That's expected. You type the refund as a positive amount; the system stores it negative so it subtracts from what you've collected.
A salesperson can't void a payment. Is it broken?
No. Voiding is restricted to owners and admin managers by design. Ask an owner or admin manager to void it. The same goes for accounting.
Can I edit a payment after recording it?
There's no edit. If something's wrong, void the payment (Owner/Manager) and record a corrected one. The void keeps the original on the ledger with its reason, so the history stays intact.
I clicked Record twice. Did the customer get charged twice?
No. The system uses one key per payment and ignores the duplicate submit, so only one payment is recorded.
Ask the assistant
In the AI chat, "how much does Jane still owe on A100?" and "what's left to close the A100 deal?" read this ledger and the deal's checklist the same way the deal page does: the deal total with F&I, what has been paid, the balance due, who has signed, and what is still to do. "Jane gave us a $1,000 deposit by check, record it" prepares a payment card for you to approve; it books money, so it always asks, and it will not let the amount exceed the balance due. Refunds and voids stay on this page.