Overview

When you receive goods from a supplier, the receiving report may include extra costs — freight, import duties, customs broker fees, or handling charges. These charges are often invoiced by a separate party (a freight forwarder, customs broker, or carrier) and arrive weeks or months after the goods bill. Luminous now lets you:

  • Classify each extra cost as Freight, Duty, Service, or Other so it posts to the right expense account.
  • Bill extra costs independently from the goods, at the time the external invoice arrives.
  • Check billing status directly from the receiving report to see what has already been billed and what is still open.

Step 1 — Classify extra costs on the receiving report

  1. Open the receiving report (Inventory → Receiving → select the report).
  2. In the Extra Costs section, each line now shows a Cost Type selector (Freight, Duty, Service, Other).
  3. Select the appropriate type for each line. If you leave it blank, Luminous infers the type from the line name (for example, a line named "Ocean Freight" is treated as Freight; "Customs Duty" as Duty). The inferred type is displayed but is only persisted when you explicitly save it.
  4. Save the receiving report.

Why this matters: The cost type determines which expense account the charge is posted to when the bill is released. A line classified as Duty reaches the Duty account; Freight reaches Freight In. Lines left as Other (or with no matching keyword) post to no account.

Step 2 — Check the extra-cost billing state

Before creating a bill, you can see what has already been billed:

  1. Open the receiving report.
  2. In the Extra Costs section, each line shows:
    • Accrued amount — the full cost recorded on the receipt.
    • Billed amount — total billed so far across all bills.
    • Remaining — what is still open.
    • Bills — links to any bills that have already covered this accrual.

This view lets you confirm whether a freight or customs invoice has been entered without navigating away from the receipt.

Step 3 — Create a bill for the extra costs

When the broker or freight invoice arrives, you have two options depending on what's on the invoice. If the invoice covers both goods and extra costs (or you want to bill them together):

  1. Open the receiving report.
  2. Click the ⋮ (three-dot) menu → Create Bill (or use the Bills tab on the linked Purchase Order).
  3. A What are you billing? dialog opens, showing product lines (grouped by purchase order) and a separate Freight, duty & other charges section for any extra costs on the receipt. Nothing is selected by default.
  4. Check the rows you're being invoiced for — product lines, extra-cost lines, or both. Adjust the quantity/amount to bill on each row if the vendor invoice differs from the accrual.
  5. Click Add N lines to bill. The bill form opens pre-filled with only the selected lines. Fill in the Bill Date, Due Date, and Vendor Invoice #, then save.

Note: If the freight/duty invoice is separate from the goods invoice (the common case — freight bills often arrive weeks later, from a different vendor): use the dedicated Bill freight & duty only action instead (⋮ menu on the receiving report). This opens a bill form pre-filled with only the unbilled extra-cost lines — no picker step needed. See "How do I create a vendor bill for freight, duty, or other charges that arrive separately from the goods invoice?"

Step 4 — Release and verify

  1. Open the bill → click Release. Status moves to Open.
  2. Open the Reconcile tab. Extra-cost lines show as Matched once they are allocated to the receipt accrual. If a line shows Unmatched, click it and select the correct accrual from the Eligible Records panel, or click Auto Reconcile.
  3. Return to the receiving report's Extra Costs section to confirm the Remaining amount has decreased.

Creating a bill from a shipment (includes extra costs automatically)

When you create a bill starting from a shipment (Purchase Order → Shipments tab → Create Bill on a shipment row), Luminous now automatically includes any unbilled freight/duty/service accruals from the linked receiving report alongside the product lines. No additional step is needed.

Frequently asked questions

Can I bill freight and goods on the same bill? Yes. When you click Create Bill from the receiving report, the "What are you billing?" picker lets you select product lines and extra-cost lines together before creating the bill — there's no separate "add" step. By default nothing is pre-selected, so you choose exactly what belongs on this bill.

What if the freight invoice is from a different vendor than the goods? Create a separate bill with the freight broker as the vendor. The extra cost accrual on the receiving report is not vendor-specific, so it can be allocated to a bill from any vendor.

What happens to existing extra costs with no cost type set? The system infers the type from the line name using common keywords (freight, duty, customs, brokerage, etc.). No data entry is required for existing records; the inferred type is used for posting until you explicitly save a choice.

Why was my duty line always posting as 'Other' before? Prior to this update, all extra-cost lines reached a bill with the line type set to Other regardless of their name. Other lines post to no account. The cost-type classification introduced here is what directs freight to Freight In and duty to the Duty account.