When creating a project, you can either enter the percentage you want to take and let the software calculate the specific amount or you can specify the dollar amount you intend to collect and let the software calculate what percentage that represents. Once the down payment is collected, a percentage based down payment credit is applied to each item on the invoice.
Let's say you are creating a new project that contains three items that are $1,000 each. Your total estimate is $3,000 and you take a down payment of $1,500. This is 50% of the total project amount. Going forward, each invoice is going to assume that 50% was already paid.
For this example, our project will have two invoices. Invoice A is for the first line item. Invoice B is for the other two line items.
When it is time to create Invoice A, you will only add the first line item for $1,000. The invoice you generate will show a $500 credit (50%) and $500 due.
When it is time to create Invoice B, you will add two line items that are $1,000 each for a total of $2,000. The invoice you generate will show a credit of $1,000 (50%) and $1,000 due.
The net effect is a $3,000 project with $1,500 collected up front and $1,500 collected in invoice payments.