How to manage anticipated disbursements

Use anticipated disbursements to record a cost you haven't yet paid to a supplier and intend to pass on to the client. Supplier payments are paid from your firm's office or general account, not the trust account. Smokeball tracks the disbursement as unpaid until you mark it as paid, helping you identify outstanding supplier payments before invoicing. 

Anticipated or regular disbursement?

The below table will help you decide the type of disbursement to enter into Smokeball depending on the use case.

Enter an anticipated disbursement

1. Open a matter, then select the Disbursements tab.
2. Select New Disbursement Entry.
   • You can also click the Create New button in the top-right of any web app screen and select Disbursement Entry to create a disbursement entry. You will need to select the matter the entry will be added to in this case.
3. Enter the Date, Subject, Description, Quantity, and Price.
   • Enter at least 1 in Quantity so Smokeball can calculate GST.
4. Choose Hard Cost or Soft Cost. Learn the difference between hard costs and soft costs.
5. Use the toggles to mark the entry as Billable, or to Write Off the amount.
6. If the Input or Output GST differs for this disbursement, enter the correct amounts.
7. Select Anticipated disbursement.
8. Enter the supplier's details: the Supplier name, Reference, and Payment Due date.
   • Leave Supplier Paid off. The disbursement stays unpaid until you mark it as paid.
9. Attach a receipt or the supplier's invoice, if you have one.
10. Select Save to save and close the entry, Save & New to save the entry and open a new window to enter another disbursement entry, or Save & Duplicate to save the entry and open a new window with the same disbursement details to create another entry that way.

You can also create entries from the bar at the top of the Disbursements tab in a matter. However, you will need to open the entry created and add further detail about it being an Anticipated Disbursement as per the above steps.

Mark an anticipated disbursement as paid

Once you've paid the supplier, mark the disbursement as paid so Smokeball and your accounting software match.

Toggling on Supplier Paid is what marks a disbursement as paid. Adding a payment date on its own does not indicate that the disbursement is paid.

Mark one disbursement as paid

1. Open the disbursement from the matter's Disbursements tab, or from Time/Fees > Disbursements.
2. Turn on Supplier Paid, then enter the payment details.
   
3. Select Save.

If your firm uses Xero or MYOB, Smokeball sends a journal entry dated today when you mark the disbursement as paid.

Mark several disbursements as paid at once

If you pay a supplier for lots of disbursements in one go, such as monthly InfoTrack searches, mark them as paid together. Smokeball sends them to Xero or MYOB as one transaction, which makes them easier to reconcile.

See Mark multiple disbursements as paid in bulk.

InfoTrack disbursements

If your firm uses the InfoTrack integration, you can have InfoTrack disbursements sync through to Smokeball as anticipated disbursements tagged to your InfoTrack supplier contact. This makes them easy to find and mark as paid in bulk.

To set this up, turn on Enable Smarter Entry Handling under Firm Settings > Entries & Activities > Disbursements. See full steps here.

Pay by cheque

If you pay the supplier by office cheque, select Supplier Paid and choose Cheque as the payment method. See Set up office payment cheques.

Find your unpaid anticipated disbursements

1. Select Time/Fees from the left-hand menu, then select the Disbursements tab.
2. Use the filters on the left to narrow the list (e.g. filter by Anticipated Disbursement among other available options).
   
3. Select Print or CSV to export the list of disbursements.

Invoicing with anticipated disbursements

Pay the supplier and mark the disbursement as paid before you invoice the client. If an invoice includes an unpaid anticipated disbursement, Smokeball shows a warning icon on the invoice and asks you to confirm before you finalise it.

If a supplier is paid after the invoice is finalised, you can still mark an anticipated disbursement as paid. You can't do this for a regular disbursement. This is why it's worth choosing Anticipated for any cost you haven't paid yet.

Edit or delete an anticipated disbursement

1. Open the disbursement from the matter's Disbursements tab, or from Time/Fees > Disbursements.
2. Make your changes, then select Save or Update. 
   • To delete the disbursement, select Delete Disbursement at the bottom of the entry.
     

How anticipated disbursements work with Xero and MYOB

• Smokeball does not send anything to Xero or MYOB when you enter an anticipated disbursement. For the disbursement itself, it only sends the supplier payment when you mark it as paid, and it doesn’t create a bill.
• If your firm reports on an accrual or hybrid basis, the amount is not recorded as a liability when you enter it, so your accountant will need to make that adjustment in Xero or MYOB.
• If a payment isn’t showing in your accounting software, check that the Supplier Paid toggle is on, then check your account mappings in the Xero or MYOB integration settings. We suggest checking the Office Payments – Hard Costs and Office Payments – Soft Costs mappings.

Good to know

• You cannot convert an anticipated disbursement directly into a trust payment. Smokeball blocks trust payments that are more than the matter’s available trust balance. If you want to pay the supplier from trust, you can remove the anticipated disbursement from the invoice, record the trust payment to the supplier, then finalise the invoice again for the lower amount. If the invoice is already finalised, you’ll first need to edit it back to a draft. See Edit, Void or Waive Invoices.
• You cannot part pay an anticipated disbursement once it has been invoiced.
• Reversing a payment - to do this, follow the steps in Edit, Void or Waive Invoices which will then make it possible to reverse payments for disbursements.