Finance overview: how money flows through BIMeta Business

BIMeta Business keeps track of the money on your projects from the moment someone logs an hour to the moment the client pays. This article is the map: it shows how time, expenses and consultant invoices turn into client invoices, which pages handle each step, and who is allowed to do what. Each step has its own detailed article, named below.

Where to find it

Everything in this article lives in the Finance group of the sidebar, which lists its pages alphabetically: Consultants, Expenses, Invoices, Recurring invoices and Time approvals (you see only the ones your role can use; a User sees just Expenses). Two related pages live elsewhere: Home → My time (where everyone logs hours) and Reports → Fee earned (where phase progress is set). You can also press Ctrl K (Jump to…) and type words like billing, payments, retainers, timesheets, receipts or insurance.

The Dashboard can show three Finance cards: Outstanding invoices (opens the unpaid invoices), Timesheets to approve (opens Time approvals) and Consultant insurance to renew (opens Consultants).

Who can use it

These are the default roles. Your firm can change them under Admin → Settings → Roles & permissions, so your access may differ. Nobody can ever approve their own time or their own expenses. See Roles and permissions: who can see and do what.

The money flow, step by step

1. The fee: what the project is worth

Each project's fee is split by phase on the project's Budget tab (its baseline scope). Approved Additional Services add to the fee of their phase. The phase fee is the ceiling for phase-progress billing: BIMeta never bills a phase for more than its fee through progress, percentage or fixed-amount billing.

2. Progress: how much of each phase is done

The Project Manager (anyone allowed to manage the project's budget) sets each phase's percent complete on Reports → Fee earned. Earned = phase fee × percent complete. A phase also counts as complete when its progress is set to 100% or when the project is moved past that phase at the phase gate. Progress drives phase-progress invoices and automatic phase billing rules.

3. Time: hours worked

1. Everyone logs hours on Home → My time, a weekly timesheet with a row per project and phase, and clicks Submit week.
2. Each saved hour carries the person's bill rate and cost rate for that day (set under Admin → Settings → Rates). A rate change applies to hours not yet approved from the rate's start date; approved hours keep the rate they were approved at.
3. An approver opens Finance → Time approvals and clicks Approve or Send back. Approved hours are locked.
4. Approved hours are now billable and unbilled. They go onto a client invoice when someone clicks Invoice approved hours, when a recurring schedule bills Approved hours worked, or when a phase billing rule bills hours. Each hour is billed once. If that invoice is voided, the hours become billable again.

See Time approvals: approve or send back timesheets.

4. Expenses: money staff spent

1. Anyone claims an expense on Finance → Expenses: date, category, what it was for, amount, and optionally the project. For a project expense they can tick Bill it to the client.
2. An approver sees it under Waiting for your approval and clicks Approve (setting a markup for billable ones, 10% by default) or Send back with a reason.
3. Reimbursing the person happens outside BIMeta (for example through payroll or your accounting system). An approved expense is your signal that it can be paid back. BIMeta does not record the reimbursement itself.
4. Billing the client: an approved, billable expense passes through to the project's next invoice as a reimbursable line, amount plus markup, once.

See Expenses: claim, approve and bill expenses.

5. Consultants: invoices the firm receives

1. Owners and Admins keep each consultant (structural, MEP, civil and so on) under Finance → Consultants, with a default markup and their insurance certificates.
2. When a consultant's invoice arrives, it is recorded against a project and then Approved. Approval is your signal that it can be paid; paying the consultant happens outside BIMeta.
3. An approved invoice marked Bill to client passes through to the project's next invoice with the consultant's markup, once.
4. Insurance certificates are tracked by expiry date. Owners and Admins are emailed 30 days before a certificate expires and again when it expires.

See Consultants: insurance certificates and consultant invoices.

6. Client invoices: billing the work

Owners and Admins create invoices on Finance → Invoices after choosing a project. There are four ways to start one:

• Invoice phase progress: bills, for each phase, what's been earned minus what earlier invoices already billed.
• Invoice approved hours: bills approved, unbilled hours at each person's bill rate.
• Invoice reimbursables only: bills only approved, billable consultant invoices and expenses.
• Blank invoice: you add the lines yourself.

Phase-progress and hours invoices also pick up the project's unbilled reimbursables automatically. Invoices can also be made for you: by Automatic phase billing rules (on phase completion, on a progress percentage or on a date) and by Recurring invoices (every month, quarter or year). See Invoices: list, filters and billing a project and Recurring invoices: retainers and scheduled billing.

7. Sending and getting paid

1. A new invoice is a Draft with no number. You can change its lines, bill-to address, tax and notes.
2. Issue and send gives it the next invoice number, today's issue date and a due date 30 days later, marks it Sent and emails it to the client's contact. From then on it can't be edited.
3. When money arrives, Record payment. A partial payment makes it Part paid; paying the full balance makes it Paid. If your firm connected QuickBooks Online under Admin → Settings → Integrations, sent invoices can be copied there and payments entered in QuickBooks can come back automatically.
4. A mistake? Void the invoice (only possible before any payment is recorded) and start again. Everything it billed (hours, expenses, consultant invoices, phase amounts) becomes billable again.

See An invoice: edit, send, record payments, print and void.

Invoice statuses at a glance

Tips and good to know

• Nothing is billed twice. Hours, expenses and consultant invoices are marked as billed when they go onto an invoice (even a draft). Voiding that invoice releases them.
• Drafts count. Phase amounts on a draft invoice count as "billed before", so an old draft you forgot about will lower what the next phase-progress invoice bills. Send it or void it.
• Rates matter. If someone has no bill rate set, their hours bill at $0. Check Admin → Settings → Rates before invoicing hours.
• The firm's currency comes from the firm profile (Admin → Settings → Setup → Firm profile & region). Invoice numbers follow the pattern under Admin → Settings → Setup → Document numbering.
• Every financial action (drafting, sending, payments, voids, approvals, rules and schedules) is recorded in the Audit log.
• Firm-wide figures built on this data appear under Reports (for example fee earned, work in progress and income).

Troubleshooting / FAQ

I approved hours. Why aren't they on the client's invoice?

Approval only makes them billable. They go on an invoice when someone bills them: Invoice approved hours, a recurring schedule or a phase billing rule that bills hours. Hours already on another invoice (even a draft) won't be added again.

Where do I mark an expense as reimbursed?

BIMeta doesn't track reimbursement payments. Use the list of approved expenses as your record of what to pay back through payroll or your accounting system.

Why can I see invoices but not create them?

IT Staff, BIM Managers and Project Managers can view invoices by default; only Business Owners and Admins can create, send, void and record payments.