User guide · Modules

Finances

Money in against money out: the expense ledger with approvals, the cash book, what guests still owe, every till cash-up, and a profit and loss statement for any period.

Purpose and who uses it

AccountantHotel ManagerSuper Admin

The books of the hotel: income from stays and the restaurant against the costs of running the place.

Payments shows what guests paid. Finances is the other half: what the hotel spends, and the two sides read together. Every expense is recorded, approved and paid as three separate steps so a manager can see money leaving before it leaves, and the profit and loss statement folds the ledger into a few lines (cost of sales, salaries, utilities, repairs, marketing, capital, taxes).

The Accountant and the Hotel Manager have full access: they record, approve, pay, void, manage categories and export. Someone with Finances at Can edit (a role you create in User Roles) can record an expense and edit it while it is still awaiting approval, but never approve one. View only reads everything and prints vouchers.

Income here is money that really arrived: folio receipts net of refunds, and till tenders that were not room charges. A bill charged to a room is not counted twice: it reaches the guest folio and counts when the guest settles the folio.

Screen anatomy

Five tabs: Overview, Expenses, Cash book, Receivables, Tills.

Finances

1
Tabs
Overview · Expenses · Cash book · Receivables · Tills. The tab is in the address bar, so a bookmark opens the right one.
2
Period bar
Today, Last 7 days, Last 30 days, Last 90 days, Month to date, Quarter, Year, or two dates, with Compare with previous period on the Overview.
3
Figures
Overview: Income, Stay receipts, Restaurant takings, Outgoing, Paid out, Net result, Margin, Refunds, Awaiting approval, Owed by guests. Each carries the change against the previous period when Compare is on.
4
Blocks
Income against outgoing per week, the net result per day, the profit and loss statement, outgoing by category and kind, cash flow by method, paid to suppliers, expenses per week, outstanding by age, largest expenses.
6
Exports
Excel and PDF of the Overview for Finances full access; the file appears in the Reports export tray when ready.

Expenses

Four figures (Awaiting approval, Approved not yet paid, Paid in the period, Committed in the period), status chips, category, kind and method filters, a search, and the table: Expense · Spent on · Description · Category · Paid to · Method · Status · Amount. Record expense opens the form; a row opens the detail drawer with the trail (recorded, approved, paid) and the buttons the status allows.

Cash book

Every movement of money in the period, newest first, with In and Out columns: folio receipts, refunds, till tenders and paid expenses. Filter by kind or method, search a code, guest, outlet or reference, and download the receipt or voucher behind any line. CSV saves the page in view.

Receivables and Tills

Receivables lists every open folio, oldest due first, with a bar chart of what is owed by how far past due. Tills lists every closed cash-up with the float, the sales, the split by tender, the expected cash, what was counted and the difference: short in red, over in green.

Recording an expense

AccountantHotel Manager

Category, description, amount, when, how it was paid and to whom; optionally from a delivery.

1
Record expense
On the Expenses tab. If the cost is a delivery that came through Inventory, pick it under From a delivery: the supplier, the description, the value at the supplier's unit costs and the date fill in.
2
Category and description
Every expense sits in one category; the category's kind decides which line of the profit and loss statement it lands on. Describe it the way you would on a receipt.
3
Amount and tax
Whole shillings, tax inclusive. Of which tax is optional and only for the record.
4
Paid via, reference, spent on
Cash, mobile money (with the network), card or bank transfer, the transaction or cheque number, and the day the cost belongs to. The day cannot be in the future.
5
Record
It waits for approval. Finances full access can tick Already paid to record petty cash as paid in one step.

Approve, pay, reject, void

AccountantHotel Manager

Three steps between a cost and the money leaving, and two ways to end it.

An expense

Awaiting approval → Approved (Approve)
Approved → Paid (Mark paid)
Awaiting approval → Paid (Mark paid (petty cash))
Awaiting approval → Rejected (Reject)
Awaiting approval → Void (Void)
Approved → Void (Void)
Paid → Void (Void)

Approve commits the cost: from then on it counts as outgoing on the day it was spent. Mark paidrecords the money leaving, with the method, reference and the day; the cash book lists it from that moment. Reject sends it back with a note to whoever recorded it. Void removes a mistaken entry from every figure while keeping it in the ledger with its note; even a paid expense can be voided.

Only Finances full access decides. The person who recorded a pending expense can still edit it; once approved, only full access edits, and a rejected or void expense is read-only.

Reading the overview

What counts as income, what counts as outgoing, and what the period does not change.

The figures
Field	Type	Notes
Income		Stay receipts (folio payments minus refunds) plus restaurant takings at the till (tenders minus refunds, room charges excluded).
Outgoing		Expenses approved or paid, counted on the day they were spent. Pending expenses are shown separately as Awaiting approval.
Paid out		The part of outgoing that is marked paid.
Net result and Margin		Income minus outgoing, and that as a share of income.
Owed by guests		Open folio balances right now, whatever the period, with the count of overdue invoices.
Profit and loss statement		Income lines, then one line per expense kind, then totals and the net result, with the previous period alongside when Compare is on.
Cash flow by method		For each of cash, mobile money, card and bank transfer: what came in, what went out (refunds and paid expenses), and the net.

Permissions

View reads; Can edit records; Full decides, manages categories and exports.

Finances beside Payments: the desk takes money without seeing the books.
Role	Finances	Payments
Super Admin	Full	Full
Hotel Manager	Full	Full
Accountant	Full	Full
Restaurant Mgr	None	View
Receptionist	None	Edit

None No accessView View onlyEdit Can editFull Full access

The Overview export and the Categories manager need Full. Receivables reads the same folios Payments does; taking money against one stays on the Payments screen.

Errors you may see

What the screen refuses and why.

400Amount must be more than zero

Why

The amount was empty or zero.

Fix

Enter the whole figure paid, tax inclusive.

400The spent-on date cannot be in the future

Why

The day chosen is after today on the hotel's clock.

Fix

Pick the day the cost belongs to.

400Select the mobile money network

Why

Mobile money needs MTN or Airtel.

Fix

Pick the network.

400Pick an active expense category

Why

The category was retired or missing.

Fix

Choose another, or restore it under Categories.

403Approving, paying and voiding expenses needs Finances full access

Why

Your role has Finances at Can edit or below.

Fix

Ask an Accountant or the Hotel Manager to decide.

409A category with that name already exists

Why

Names are unique per hotel.

Fix

Use the existing category or a different name.

Committed: Approved or paid: counted as outgoing on the day spent.
Cash book: Every movement of money in date order, in and out.
Receivables: Money guests still owe on open folios.
Over / short: Counted cash minus the cash a till should have held at close.
Voucher: The printable record of one expense: the facts, who did what, and signature lines.