Re: Invoice reminder letter

[Stroller <..hidden..>]

On 5 Feb 2009, at 21:37, Chris Travers wrote:
> > Does LedgerSMB not have any facility to print an reminder letter (or
> > other generic form letter) to customers in its database?
> > ...
> That might be helpful.  What format would the output be?  PDF/PS?
> Text for an email?  Something else?

All of the above, really. It needs the same options as to email /  
print / post a regular invoice. I had kinda envisioned a letter on  
headed paper, as hopefully that'll have more

Actually, I've had a bit of a revelation whilst preparing this reply.  
I knew I'd asked about this before, or at least something similar.

Pete's suggestion is good - it is simple & straightforward - but as an  
improvement the reminder may sometimes need to refer to multiple  
invoices outstanding on one account.

So I just found my previous related message:
http://www.mail-archive.com/..hidden../msg02268.html
And the reply:
http://www.mail-archive.com/..hidden../msg02268.html

I think the reason I ignored this before is because that report  
doesn't show payments, which IMO ideally it should. I probably decided  
that this was "buggy" and to snobbishly ignore this report forever.

Anyway, if one just uses alternative templates, then this is the way  
to do it, IMO. One can say "please bring your attention the  
outstanding invoices, see list below, I would be grateful for payment  
at your earliest convenience" or I think one can be clever and use  
\ifthenelse to insert the ", and " necessary to change "to outstanding  
invoice 0123, I would be grateful" to " "outstanding invoices 0123 and  
0133, I would be grateful".

I'm not sure if the best way is a drop-down alternative template to AR  
Aging - IMO that kinda "hides" it from the casual user - but it  
certainly could use the same code. I do kinda like the idea of it  
being available from completed AR Transactions &/or Outstanding  
reports, which I use all the time, but maybe now I've discovered AR  
Aging (which I find to be a completely opaque term) I'll start using  
it directly.

There's something about using different *invoice* templates that kinda  
bothers me - clearly Pete's usage is legitimate, but I rather feel  
that it could lead a user or site to the temptation of using  
alternative invoice designs and a different layout being sent to the  
customer from the hardcopy kept in paper records. I would expect this  
to be a big no-no with the Inland Revenue, were the appearances  
significantly different.

Stroller.