How invoicing works

Learn more about the basics of Stripe Invoicing.

Invoices move through different statuses from the time they’re created to when they’re paid. Stripe calls this the automatic collection workflow. Before you begin, create customers and products and prices to facilitate future transactions. You can use both the Dashboard and the API to set up and interact with Stripe Invoicing.

Invoice lifecycle

The basic lifecycle for invoices looks like this:

A new invoice begins with a draft status.
Stripe finalizes the invoice. (You can no longer make any changes to it.)
The status is set to open and Stripe automatically attempts to pay the invoice using your customer’s default payment method.
If payment succeeds, Stripe updates the status to paid.
If payment fails, the invoice remains open.

In this lifecycle example, Stripe doesn’t notify the customer about the invoice. We automatically charge the customer shortly after we generate the invoice. However, if you enable customer emails, we send an email receipt.

Invoice statuses

Invoices can take on one of five statuses. These statuses allow you to draft and revise invoices before finalization, sending, and attempting payment. In the Dashboard, open invoices appear as pending when their associated payment intent is in the pending state.

Status	Description	Possible Actions
draft	The starting status for all invoices. You can still edit the invoice at this point.	You can finalize the invoice to `open`, or delete it if it’s a one-off.
open	The invoice has been finalized, and is awaiting customer payment. You can no longer edit the invoice, but you can revise it.	Send the invoice. You can also mark the invoice as `paid`, `void` or `uncollectible`.
paid	This invoice was paid.	No actions possible.
void	This invoice was a mistake, and must be canceled.	No actions possible.
uncollectible	The customer is unlikely to pay this invoice (treat it as bad debt in your accounting process).	You can void or pay the invoice.

Draft invoices

Draft invoices are still editable and remain unsent. At this point, you can finalize the invoice, or delete it.

Open invoices

The invoice has been finalized, and is awaiting customer payment. You can no longer edit the invoice. In this state, you can send the invoice. You can also mark the invoice as paid, void, or uncollectible.

Invoices that have an amount due that’s less than the minimum chargeable amount automatically transition from an open to paid status and debit the amount from the customer’s credit balance.

Paid invoices

When a customer pays for an invoice through Stripe, the invoice moves into the paid status. This status is terminal, which means that paid invoices can never take on another status.

To attempt a payment through the Dashboard, open the Invoice details page and click Charge customer.

Note

If a customer paid an invoice out of band (outside of Stripe), you can manually mark an open invoice as paid in the Dashboard. From the Invoice details page, click More and select Change invoice status. In the resulting dialog, select the Paid option.

Voided invoices

Voiding an invoice is conceptually similar to deleting (canceling) it. However, voiding an invoice maintains a paper trail, which allows you to look up the invoice by number. Voided invoices are treated as zero-value for reporting purposes, and aren’t payable.

After you void an invoice, the Hosted Invoice Page is still accessible, and displays a message indicating that the invoice has been voided. You can only void invoices when they’re open or uncollectible.

To void an invoice from the Dashboard:

Go to the Invoice details page.
Click More and select Change invoice status.
In the resulting dialog, select Void.

Uncollectible invoices

Sometimes your customers won’t be able to pay their outstanding bills. For example, assume that you supply 1,000 USD worth of services to your customer, but they’ve since declared bankruptcy, and (even after liquidating assets) won’t be able to pay the outstanding invoice balance.

As a result, you decide to write off the invoice as unlikely to be paid. In this case, you can update the status of the invoice to be uncollectible. This allows you to track the amount owed for reporting purposes as part of your bad debt accounting process.

You can mark an open invoice as uncollectible through the Invoice details page by clicking Change invoice status.

Deleting draft invoices

You can delete a draft invoice at any time.

To delete a draft invoice:

Go to the Invoices page.
Click the overflow menu () next to the draft invoice.
Click Delete draft. You can’t recover deleted draft invoices.