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Gift vouchers are a great way for your clients to introduce your business to their family and friends. With Timely, gift vouchers can be bought online, sent by email, or printed out and given in person. You have control over the gift voucher process, from creation to redemption. So you can decide if they can be purchased online, voided, or if they expire. You can also determine gift voucher terms and conditions, allowing you to customise what information is included on the printed voucher.
It is important that you keep track of your gift vouchers for your business accounting. Your accountant will need information regarding how many gift vouchers you have sold, and how many have expired without being used (if you decide expiry is part of your T&Cs of gift vouchers). In this guide you will learn how gift vouchers impact accounting.
How do gift vouchers show in my balance sheet?
A gift voucher is treated as a liability until they are redeemed. If a gift voucher expires, then it's no longer a liability for your business. It will be treated as revenue instead. For information on the differences, see our help guide How to understand liability vs revenue.
What happens when a gift voucher expires?
When a gift voucher expires, we will automatically create an invoice which debits the value of the voucher from your liabilities. In the same invoice, we will record that gift voucher value as revenue. This means that the total value of the invoice will be $0.00 (or your local currency).
How to see details of expired gift vouchers in reports
While the net value of the invoice is $0.00 (or your local currency) and won't be included in your executive summary report, the new revenue will be shown in your sales report. You will see this under the line total gift vouchers expired for the period figure. You can also see it in the GV expiry column in the sales by staff member totals.
How to see details of expired gift vouchers in a client's record
To view the updated invoice. Go to the gift voucher in the client's record. Click the activity tab, then the invoice number to see the details.
How to handle gift voucher expiry with accounting integrations
If you have Xero or QuickBooks connected, then a copy of the expiration sale will be sent to your accounting system. This will ensure that the revenue and liability accounts in your accounting system are also updated.
If you choose to reactivate the voucher, then the expiry invoice in Timely will automatically be deleted. To ensure your accounts are up to date, you will need to manually delete the associated invoice in your accounting system.