Collect money upfront on an estimate or open work order, automatically apply it once the invoice is created, and keep your QuickBooks ledger clean.

A Deposit is a pre-payment that a customer makes against a Work Order before it has been invoiced. It's perfect for situations like:

When the work is finished and you create the invoice, ShopView automatically applies the deposit to that invoice — you don't have to do anything manually. The deposit also syncs to QuickBooks Online as an unapplied payment, then gets matched to the invoice when invoicing happens, so your books stay accurate.

Deposit is gated by a separate permission, which is granted by default to:

If a teammate needs deposit access, an Admin can adjust their role under Settings → Staff.

Shop owners and service managers can collect deposits on Work Orders before the work is invoiced or when a Work Order is in a WO status is one of:

You'll find the button 'Add Deposit' on the Work Order → Finance tab, right next to the Create Invoice button. Deposits can be added from the Work Order Finance tab, are visible on both the Work Order and Customer Payments pages, and are automatically applied to the final invoice balance. Deposits also sync to QuickBooks as unapplied payments and are applied to invoices automatically when created.

Note: Once a Work Order has been invoiced, the Add Deposit option goes away — at that point you'd just take a regular payment against the invoice.

You'll see a confirmation that the deposit was created, and the deposit will now show in three places (see next section).

If a required field is missing, you'll see an inline validation message. Closing the modal with X will discard everything — nothing is saved unless you click Make Deposit.

The deposit appears as a row inside the Payments section of the related Estimate or Invoice. To make it visually distinct from a regular payment, the Payment Method column shows the method with - Deposit appended:

The deposit appears as a new row in the customer's payments list, with these column values:

Click the expand arrow on the deposit row to see which Work Order the deposit was made against:

When you create the invoice for that Work Order, the deposit is automatically applied. In the Payments section of the invoice you'll see the deposit row with:

The invoice's Balance Due is automatically reduced by the deposit. Example:

Customers viewing the invoice in the Customer Portal see the same — the applied deposit shows alongside other payments and the remaining balance reflects the deposit.

From the Customer → Payments page (or from the Work Order → Finance tab), find the deposit row and click the delete icon. You'll see a confirmation dialog (same flow as deleting any other payment). Once deleted:

To "move" a deposit to a different Work Order: there isn't a direct transfer. Delete the deposit on the original WO and create a new deposit on the target WO.

If the deposit ends up being larger than the final invoice total, ShopView handles it for you automatically. Example:

You'll see a toast notification confirming this:

"Invoice has been automatically marked as paid. Payment created. A credit for $192.53 has been created for the excess amount."

The leftover credit appears on the Customer → Unpaid Invoices tab labeled as Deposit (similar to a regular Credit), and can be applied to a future invoice the same way you'd apply any credit.

When you're taking payment on a future invoice for the same customer, any leftover deposits show in the Payment modal alongside other credits. Each row shows:

Select the deposit to apply it. It can be split across multiple invoices — ShopView calculates the applied amounts automatically. Anything left over remains available for future use.

If your shop is connected to QuickBooks Online, deposits sync automatically:

Heads up: deposits are pushed to the Received Payment account in QBO. We may add a dedicated mapping (e.g., a Liabilities account) for deposits in a future release.

No. To prevent accounting issues, ShopView blocks switching the customer on a Work Order that already has a deposit. You'll see the message:

"Customer cannot be changed due to a deposit being made. Delete the deposit before switching customer on an open work order."

Delete the deposit first, switch the customer, then re-create the deposit if needed.

No — you'll need to delete the deposit first, then you can delete the Work Order.

The deposit stays on the original Work Order. It is not moved or split. If you need it on a new WO, delete and recreate.

Reversing the invoice converts the deposit back into an Unapplied Deposit on the customer (same state as a fresh deposit). The deposit stays associated with the customer and can be applied to a new invoice. This matches QuickBooks behavior.

The regular payment is deleted as normal. The deposit stays intact on the original Work Order or customer record.

Not in this release — deposits are tied to a Work Order. Customer-level (or fleet-level) deposits are on the roadmap.

Not in this release — deposits are taken by the shop on the customer's behalf. The customer does see the applied deposit on their invoice once it's created.

If you run into anything unexpected with deposits — especially around QuickBooks sync — reach out to ShopView Support via the in-app messenger and we'll take a look.