Skip to Content
Stays & billing

Folios, charges, payments and the city ledger

One folio per stay collects every charge — room nights and their fees from the night audit, restaurant cheques, minibar, spa, damages. Deposits and payments settle it; the invoice is the accounting document; companies and agents are billed back through the city ledger.

For:Front-office agentCashierAccountantNight auditor

Where:Billing › Folios · Charges · Payments · Deposits · Cashier Shifts · City Ledger · Agent Commissions

A folio: charges with their fee lines, payments, deposits, windows and routing.
A folio: charges with their fee lines, payments, deposits, windows and routing.
The city ledger: folios billed back to companies, agents and operators.
The city ledger: folios billed back to companies, agents and operators.

Before you start

Fee rules on the property (a country preset: Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Abu Dhabi).
VAT on accommodation on the property.
Payment methods with journals; a cash and a bank journal in Accounting.

How to

Post a charge by hand

  1. Open the folio, Add Charge: kind, product or description, quantity, net price.
  2. Apply service charge / fees is ticked for room and F&B kinds; untick it for a discount or a damage charge.
  3. The fee lines (service charge, city tax, municipality, tourism) appear under the charge, each inside or outside the VAT base as the rule says.

Take a payment

  1. Take Payment: method, amount, reference (card authorisation code, cheque number).
  2. A foreign-currency payment converts at the day's rate; the folio shows the balance in the quoted currency too.
  3. The payment goes to the cashier's open shift and to the method's journal in Accounting.

Split or route charges

  1. Windows: a folio has up to eight billing windows, each with its own payer — the company pays room and breakfast, the guest pays the bar.
  2. Routing rules on the reservation or the folio send a charge kind or a department to a window or to another folio (a group master).
  3. Split a charge by percentage; transfer selected charges to another folio from the list.

Bill a company back

  1. The reservation carries the account and the guarantee "company account".
  2. At check-out choose Transfer to City Ledger: an invoice is issued to the company on its payment terms, the folio shows as transferred.
  3. Billing › City Ledger lists them; Accounting › Customer Invoices ages them; the agent's commission accrues under Agent Commissions and becomes a vendor bill in batches.

Cashier shift

  1. Billing › Cashier Shifts › New with the opening float.
  2. Every payment you post lands on your open shift.
  3. Close Shift with the counted cash; the difference is recorded.

Questions the desk asks

Why does the folio total differ from the reservation estimate?

The estimate uses today's rules; the folio posts each night with the rules and rate of that night, plus whatever was consumed.

A charge is wrong and already invoiced.

Issue a credit note from the invoice; the charge cannot be cancelled once invoiced.

See also: The night audit and the business date Front desk: arrivals, in house, departures

← Front desk: arrivals, in house, departures The night audit and the business date →