Managing products
A product is a saved line for your invoices and estimates: a name, a description, a price, a unit and a tax rate. Goods and services are both products; there is no separate type and no stock count. The Products page in the main navigation lists them, and picking a product on a document line fills the line in from the record.
The product list
The list can be searched and filtered, for example by price, unit or tax rate, and it is where you add a product, import products from a file or export the list as a CSV file. See Importing products, Exporting products and Filtering and customising list views.
From a product's row you can edit, duplicate or delete it. Selecting several rows shows the bulk actions; see Bulk actions on customers and products.
The product record
A product holds a name, a description, a unit, a code and a price with its tax rate. The name and description are copied onto the document line, so the description is what the customer reads under the line name. The unit is picked from a list that covers pieces, hours, kilograms and more, and it is printed next to the quantity. The SKU / code is your own code for the product and matches products on import.
The price is entered either without tax or with it. With Price includes VAT off, you enter the Net price and Sliptree calculates the gross price from the tax rate; with it on, you enter the Gross price and the net price is calculated. The tax rate comes from your business's tax rates, and an inactive rate shows a warning until you replace it. See Managing tax rates.
Products on a document
Typing in the name field of a document line searches your products, and picking one copies its name, description, price, unit and tax rate onto the line. Anything on the line can then be changed for that document alone, for example a lower price for one customer, without touching the product. See Editor tips: inline products, customers, taxes, and reordering rows.
A line that was typed in by hand, without picking a product, is saved as a new product when the document is saved. The switch for this is Save line items as products under Currency, prices & products in your business settings, and it is on by default. Turn it off if you want the product list to hold only what you add yourself.
What a document keeps
A document line keeps the values it was given, not a link to the current product. Changing a product's price or tax rate later affects documents made after the change; documents that already exist stay as they were. To change the rate on every product at once, see How do I update the tax rate on my products?.
Deleting a product
Deleting a product removes it from the list and cannot be undone. The documents that used it keep their lines unchanged.
Common questions
- VAT changed and every product still has the old rate. See How do I update the tax rate on my products?.
- Prices should be shown including VAT. The Price includes VAT switch sets how a product's price is entered; how prices are displayed on documents is set under Display prices and amounts as in Business settings.
- One customer gets a different price. Change the price on the document line; the product keeps its own price.
- The product list has lines I never added. Those were saved from documents; turn off Save line items as products in your business settings.
- Products from another system. See Importing products; the SKU keeps the rows matched on a later import.
- Stock or inventory. Sliptree does not count stock. A product is a price list entry, not an inventory item.