Invoice vs. receipt vs. quote
The three documents on this site are nearly the same page of paper: same layout, same addresses, same column of line items, same arithmetic underneath. What separates them is a claim about money. An invoice requests payment that has not been made. A receipt confirms payment that has. A quote prices work that has not been agreed to yet. Everything else follows from which of those three claims you are making.
An invoice requests payment
An invoice is issued by the seller, normally once the goods are delivered or the work is done, and it says: this amount is owed, here is what it covers, pay it by this date. It carries a document number so both sides can refer to the same paper months later, an issue date, and usually a due date that says when payment is expected. The invoice generator ends with a balance due, and its second date is the due date.
A receipt confirms payment already made
A receipt asserts the opposite of an invoice: nothing is owed, this much was paid, on this date, by this method. The seller issues it after the money has moved; the buyer keeps it. On a cash job it is often the only record either side will hold, with no bank statement behind it, which is why the payment method is worth stating rather than assuming. The receipt generator ends with an amount paid and has a Paid by field for it.
A quote prices work not yet agreed
A quote goes out before anything happens. It is the seller telling a prospective customer what the job would cost if they went ahead — the only one of the three that describes a hypothetical. Its second date is a valid-until date rather than a due date, because a price given in March need not still be on offer in November. The quote generator ends with a quote total, which is a price, not a demand.
How much a quote commits you to varies. Whether an accepted quote forms a binding contract at that price depends on the jurisdiction, and on what the quote itself says: a document reading “fixed price, valid 30 days” and one reading “estimate only, subject to survey” are read differently under the same law. Some trades treat a quote as fixed and an estimate as approximate, but that is a convention rather than a legal test. If the figure is large enough that being held to it would hurt, the conditions written into the notes — capped at 600 characters here — tend to matter more than the word at the top of the page, and they are worth checking against the rules where you trade.
Why the bottom line carries the whole distinction
The final line is not cosmetic. A receipt reading “balance due” invites your customer to pay a second time. A quote reading “balance due” demands money that is not owed yet. The error is easy to make, because these documents are often copies of each other: a receipt built from last month's invoice keeps the invoice's total label unless someone changes it. Each generator here sets the wording from the document type instead. The arithmetic above the line is identical in all three — subtotal, discount, tax, shipping, total — and is set out on the methodology page.
One job, built three ways
Here is that distinction as the generator's own engine draws it. Take a fictional job: Harbor Lane Joinery fits oak shelving for Pell & Daughter — one fitted unit at $640.00, 1.5 hours of site visit at $48.00 an hour, and 12 brass fixings at $2.35 each — with sales tax added on top at 7.5%. Built as an invoice, a receipt and a quote dated 14 September 2026, with the number field left blank, the three come out of the engine like this:
| Built as | Heading | Default number | Bottom-line label | Figure |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| invoice | INVOICE | INV-20260914 | Balance due | $795.72 |
| receipt | RECEIPT | RCT-20260914 | Amount paid | $795.72 |
| quote | QUOTE | QTE-20260914 | Quote total | $795.72 |
Every figure in the last column is the same $795.72, and so is every line above it: 1 × $640.00 = $640.00; 1.5 × $48.00 = $72.00; 12 × $2.35 = $28.20; a subtotal of $740.20; tax of $55.52. The engine ran the identical arithmetic three times and changed two words — the heading and the bottom-line label, each looked up from the document type — plus the name of the second date, which is a due date on the invoice and a valid-until date on the quote. Everything this page has said about the three documents reduces, inside the tool, to those lookups.
The line amounts bear a closer look, because a product like 12 × $2.35 is the kind that drifts in floating point. The engine holds every amount in whole cents and rounds each line once, so the three printed lines add to the printed subtotal; the tax of $55.52 is 7.5% of the taxable $740.20, rounded half away from zero at the cent. That arithmetic, worked through on more documents, is the subject of how invoice totals are computed.
Amount paid and balance due, document by document
Now suppose Pell & Daughter paid $300.00 on account before the invoice went out. Entered in the Already paid field, the invoice keeps its total of $795.72, records the payment, and ends with a balance due of $495.72: total minus paid. Suppose instead they paid $900.00 against it, more than the total. The balance due is $0.00, not a negative figure: the engine floors it at zero, as the methodology page records, because a request for payment cannot sensibly ask for less than nothing.
The receipt and quote generators have no Already paid field, and the engine underneath would not use one: it passes an amount-paid figure through to the totals only when the document is an invoice. The joinery receipt built with the same $300.00 handed to the engine discards it; the bottom line reads “Amount paid” and shows $795.72 — the whole amount, because a receipt asserts that the whole amount arrived. In this engine a receipt never shows a part payment; a document that needed to would be an invoice with the wrong label on it. A quote behaves the same way for the opposite reason: nothing has been paid against a price that has not been accepted, so its “Quote total” is simply $795.72. The engine likewise keeps a payment method only on a receipt — an invoice built with “Bank transfer” in that field has it dropped — which is why the Paid by field belongs to the receipt alone. What each label protects against, and how the three bottom lines are chosen, is set out in receipts, quotes and the bottom-line label.
The usual sequence
- Quote — the seller prices the work. Nothing is owed.
- Acceptance — the customer agrees to go ahead.
- Work or delivery — the thing being paid for happens.
- Invoice — the seller requests payment. Balance due.
- Payment — the money moves.
- Receipt — the seller confirms it arrived. Amount paid.
Plenty of transactions skip steps. An over-the-counter sale is payment and receipt, with no invoice or quote. Deposit work runs the loop twice: quote, deposit invoice, deposit receipt, then the work and a final invoice for the remainder. Where part of the money has already arrived, the “Already paid” field subtracts it, so the balance due is what is genuinely outstanding.
The deposit loop, computed
Here is that double loop on a fictional fencing job, with every figure from the engine. Northfield Fencing quotes R. Okafor for 14 cedar panels at $95.00 fitted, 7 bags of post concrete at $6.40 and 1 gate hung at $210.00, with no tax line, on 3 September 2026: QTE-20260903, a quote total of $1,584.80, valid until 3 October 2026.
The customer accepts and a deposit of half is agreed. The deposit invoice carries one line — “Deposit, half of quote QTE-20260903” at $792.40 — and ends with a balance due of $792.40. When the money arrives, the deposit receipt carries the same line and ends with an amount paid of $792.40, paid by Bank transfer. Then the fence goes up. The final invoice lists the three original lines again, total $1,584.80, enters the $792.40 already received in the Already paid field, and ends with a balance due of $792.40.
Four documents, and at no point did the tool carry a figure from one to the next. Each was typed in fresh, because the tool stores nothing between sessions, and the quote number on the deposit line was typed too. What the engine guarantees is narrower and more useful: that the deposit line, the receipt and the credit on the final invoice are the same $792.40 to the cent, because each was computed in integer cents from the same typed figure, and that the final balance due is the quote total less that deposit rather than an approximation of it.
Where a proforma invoice fits
A proforma invoice looks like an invoice and is not acting as one. It is sent before the sale is final — to let a customer raise a purchase order, to accompany goods through customs, or to ask for payment in advance — and it does not record a completed sale. Tax systems generally treat it as a preliminary document rather than the invoice that supports an accounting entry, though what counts as a valid invoice differs by country. In substance it sits closer to a quote than an invoice; the real invoice follows once the sale is done. This site does not produce one: use a quote for work not yet agreed, or an invoice with advance-payment terms in the notes.
What the number field carries, and what it does not
Each of the three documents gets a number, because the engine never issues one without: a blank number field becomes a date-based default, prefixed by kind. The joinery trio above, built blank on 14 September 2026, came out as INV-20260914, RCT-20260914 and QTE-20260914 — three prefixes, one date. Type a number and yours is used instead, with stray spaces trimmed off: a number typed as “HLJ-0418” with a space either side becomes HLJ-0418.
What the default does not do is count. A second invoice built blank on the same day comes out as INV-20260914 again — the same number, because the tool has never seen the first one. Nothing is stored between sessions, so there is no sequence for the engine to continue, and a quote's number does not travel to the invoice that follows it unless you type it there. How to number invoices covers the schemes and the register you keep instead.
The dates are checked more strictly than the number. A quote whose valid-until date falls before its own date is refused with “The second date cannot be before the document date.”, and a document with no name on the receiving side with “Enter who the document is for.”. The engine is permissive about the parties, which can be as short as a single name with the details block left empty, and strict about the figures and the dates — a missing address is an inconvenience, a wrong total is a dispute.
Tax looks the same on all three
The tax arithmetic does not know which document it is on; it knows only the mode you chose. Marlow Studio prices a half-day portrait session at $360.00 and 6 retouched prints at $15.00, all in — a subtotal of $450.00. With tax set to “already included” at 20%, the engine divides by 1 + the rate to find the net, $375.00, and reports tax of $75.00; the total stays $450.00. That tax line is identical whether the document is the quote sent before the session, the invoice after it, or the receipt once it is paid.
The error the division avoids can be measured with the same engine. Setting the mode to “added on top” against the same prices computes 20% of the gross — $90.00 — which is exactly what subtracting a percentage from an inclusive price produces. It overstates the tax by $15.00, which is 20% of the correct figure: the rate itself, as sales tax vs. VAT explains. The division works at any rate: at 8.5% the same $450.00 contains $35.25 of tax on a net of $414.75. Which mode applies to what you sell is not something the engine decides, and this site does not advise on it; the mechanics, rate by rate, are in inclusive vs. exclusive tax arithmetic.
What the generator does and does not do here
What it does: sets the heading and the bottom-line label from the document type; runs the same integer-cent arithmetic under all three; subtracts an amount already paid on an invoice and floors the balance at zero; issues a date-based default number when the field is blank; keeps a Paid by line on receipts; accepts notes up to 600 characters, tax and discount rates up to 100%, and 10 currency symbols that label the figures without converting them; and holds up to 200 lines per document, as the methodology page records.
What it does not: carry a number, a figure or a customer from one document to the next, or number documents sequentially across sessions — it stores nothing; track whether an invoice was paid, or turn it into a receipt when it is; produce a proforma invoice; or apply any jurisdiction's rules about what a quote commits you to, what a receipt must contain, or how documents must be numbered. It is a document generator, not accounting and not tax advice. The full list of deliberate omissions is on the methodology page, and the other guides are indexed at the guides page.
Questions
Can I make a receipt by retitling an invoice?
There is nothing to retitle: the generators set the heading and the bottom-line label from the document type. The same lines built as a receipt print RECEIPT at the top and “Amount paid” at the bottom, where the invoice printed INVOICE and “Balance due”. A receipt made by copying an invoice's wording would still say balance due, which invites a second payment. Enter the same lines in the receipt generator instead.
Why is there no Already paid field on the receipt or quote generator?
Because the engine applies an amount paid only to an invoice, where total minus paid is the balance due. On a receipt the whole total is the amount paid — the joinery receipt above shows $795.72, and a paid figure handed to the engine for a receipt is discarded — and on a quote nothing has been paid against a price that has not been accepted. The field exists only on the invoice generator.
Why does the balance due show zero when more than the total was paid?
The engine floors the balance due at zero rather than printing a negative amount. The joinery invoice with $900.00 entered against a total of $795.72 ends with a balance due of $0.00. A request for payment cannot sensibly ask for less than nothing; any refund is a separate matter the invoice does not record.
Will the quote number carry over to the invoice?
No. The tool stores nothing between sessions, so each document starts blank. Left blank, the number field fills from the document date with a prefix for the kind — the quote and invoice above came out as QTE-20260914 and INV-20260914 — and two documents built blank on the same day share a number. Type the number you want and keep your own register.
Is tax computed differently on a quote than on an invoice?
No. The arithmetic depends on the tax mode, not the document type. The studio prices above contain $75.00 of tax at 20% whether they appear on a quote, an invoice or a receipt, and switching the mode to added on top would compute $90.00 on all three. Which mode fits what you sell is a question this site does not answer.
Where do the conditions of a quote go?
In the notes field, which holds up to 600 characters and prints on the document. The engine does not interpret the notes — it only trims them and enforces the length limit. The date rules it enforces are that both dates are real calendar dates and that the second date is not before the first; a valid-until date that breaks either is refused, with “Choose a valid second date.” for a date such as 30 February and “The second date cannot be before the document date.” for one before the quote's own date. What the wording commits you to depends on the rules where you trade, which this site does not interpret.
Deciding which one you need
One question usually settles it: has the money moved? If it has, issue a receipt. If it has not but the work is agreed, issue an invoice. If neither the money nor the agreement exists yet, issue a quote. What a document must contain to satisfy a tax authority is a separate question: required labels, registration numbers, and numbering rules vary by country and sometimes by state, and this tool applies none of them for you. What to put on an invoice covers the fields most systems expect, but the answer that binds you is your own jurisdiction's, not this page. Nothing here is tax or legal advice.