Discount a sales transaction

Sage Intacct offers a flexible pricing platform that lets you apply sales discounts through price lists and price schedules, set discounts for a specific customer or contact, and apply a discount directly on the sales transaction.

This topic contains examples of some of the different ways you can apply discounts directly to a sales transaction. The main difference between these discount examples is how the discount affects your reporting.

Apply a discount to the line item price

When you apply a discount to the line item price, the discount is not separated for reporting purposes.

You can enter a discount in two ways in the sales transaction Entries table, depending on the transaction definition configuration:

• Enter the discounted price
• Apply a discount percentage to the line item

Enter the discounted price

Let's say you have an item called widgets that has a regular unit price of 10.00 each. A customer orders 100 widgets, so you want to give them a 15% discount.

To enter the discount price:

1. Create or edit an Order Entry transaction.
2. In the Entries table, select the Item.

   If the item has a price list entry, the system populates the Price field with the Suggested price when you select the item.

   The system calculates the Suggested price as the number of base units in the selected unit of measure multiplied by the price per base unit identified for the item after all price lists have been evaluated. Learn more about unit of measure groups.
   Enter the Quantity.
3. Manually calculate the discounted price and do one of the following:
   • Enter the discounted unit price directly in the Price field.
   • Enter the discounted total price in the Extended price field.
   The Quantity, Price, and Extended price fields are related. If you change one of these fields, the system updates the other two fields as applicable.

Apply a discount percentage

To apply a discount percentage:

1. Create or edit an Order Entry transaction.
2. In the Entries table, select the Item.

   If the item has a price list entry, the system populates the Price field with the Suggested price when you select the item.

   The system calculates the Suggested price as the number of base units in the selected unit of measure multiplied by the price per base unit identified for the item after all price lists have been evaluated. Learn more about unit of measure groups.
   Enter the Quantity.
3. If the item does not have a price list entry and you know the price, enter the regular unit price in the Price field.
4. Enter the discount percentage as a positive number in the Discount percent field. The system automatically calculates the Extended price.

Add a discount as a negative line item

You can add a discount as a line item with a negative quantity or price. You might to do this for the following reasons:

• You want to report on the discount amounts
• You want to show a discount line on an invoice
• The sales transaction includes an inventory item, and the discount should not affect the inventory quantity or value

If you are discounting an item that requires revenue to be deferred, the discount line item can have its own revenue recognition schedule that would recognize negative amounts each period. It could also be converted to a recurring template if you wanted the negative line item to repeat in every invoice.

For example, let's say you have an item called widgets that has a regular unit price of 10 each. A customer orders 100 widgets, so you want to give them a 15% discount and you want the discount to be displayed on the invoice.

To enter a discount as a negative line item:

1. Create or edit an Order Entry transaction.
2. In a row in the Entries table, enter the line item information for the item you want to sell.

   In this example, select the widget item and enter 100 in the Quantity field and 10.00 in the Price field.

3. In another row, select a Discount item, such as Discount 15%.
4. Manually calculate the amount of the discount and enter the discount as a negative number.

   In this example, 15% of 10.00 = 1.50. So, enter 100 in the Quantity field and -1.50 in the Price field.

   Entries Show defaults

   Discount calculation example

   		Item ID*	Quantity*	Unit	Discount percent	Price*	Extended price
   	1	01--Widgets	100	Each		10.00	1,000.00
   	2	55--Sales discount 15%	100	Each		-1.50	-150.00
   	3
   		Total					850.00

   When you print the invoice, the invoice might appear with 1 line for the Widgets item for an amount of 1,000.00 and 1 line for the Sales discount 15% item for an amount of -150.00, making the total amount 850.00.

    

Apply a discount to the entire sales transaction

The system calculates the transaction total for a transaction with a subtotal discount as follows:

sum of all line items * (1- subtotal discount percentage)

If the discount is not apportioned, the discount subtotal could be mapped to debit a sales discount account and credit an accounts receivable account. In this way, you could report on the discounts. If the discount is apportioned, then the discount would not be available for reporting.

To enter a discount as a subtotal:

1. Create or edit an Order Entry transaction.
2. In the Entries table, enter the line item information for each item you want to sell and enter the regular price information.
3. In the Subtotals table, complete one of the following actions:
   • If the discount is set up as a percentage, either accept the value in the Percent field next to the Sales discount subtotal or change it to the discount percent that you want using a positive number.
   • If the discount is set up as an amount, accept the value in the Transaction value field next to the Sales discount subtotal or change it to the discount amount that you want using a positive number.
4. To view the discount calculation on the sales transaction, select Calculate subtotals.

   Entries Show defaults

   Subtotals table entries example

   		Item ID*	Quantity*	Unit	Suggested price	Price*	Extended price
   	1	01--Small widgets	100	Each	10.00	10.00	1,000.00
   	2	02--Big widgets	100	Each	20.00	20.00	2,000.00
   		Total					3,000.00

   Calculate subtotals

   Calculate subtotals example

   	Description	Percent	Transaction value	Transaction total
   1	Subtotal	--	--	3,000.00
   2	Sales discount	15	450.00	-450.00
   	Total			2,550.00