What we’ve been working on at Lite Books for October 2026
October isn’t quite over yet, but it’s already been a busy month for Lite Books!
We’ve been working on a number of improvements to make invoicing, payments and customer management a little easier for Irish businesses.
Some of this month’s updates are small changes that make everyday tasks quicker, while others introduce completely new ways to manage payments, send reminders and keep customers informed.
Here’s a look at what we’ve been working on and what’s already available in Lite Books this October.
More Flexible Invoice Payment Options
One of the improvements we’ve made this month involves customers paying deposits through Revolut.
For businesses that request a deposit before starting a job, it’s important that customers can pay the amount requested rather than having to pay the entire outstanding balance.
We’ve fixed an issue where Revolut payments could request the full remaining invoice amount, even when a deposit had been specified.
Customers can now pay the requested deposit or the remaining balance, depending on what’s due.
This is particularly useful for tradespeople, contractors and service businesses that take deposits before beginning work.
More Invoice Reminders to Help You Get Paid
Nobody enjoys chasing customers for overdue payments.
That’s why we’ve expanded the automatic invoice reminder system in Lite Books.
Previously, the system supported two reminders. We’ve now increased this to four, giving businesses more opportunities to remind customers about upcoming and outstanding payments.
The default reminders are:
- 3 days before an invoice is due: A friendly reminder that payment is coming up.
- 7 days after the due date: A reminder that payment is overdue.
- 14 days after the due date: A follow-up for invoices that remain unpaid.
- 30 days after the due date: A further reminder about the outstanding balance.
You can also manage the reminder email templates through your settings.
The idea isn’t to bombard customers with emails. It’s to give businesses a simple, professional way to follow up on payments without having to remember to do everything manually.
A friendly reminder at the right time can often save an awkward phone call later!
Discounts on Individual Invoice Items
We’ve also made discounts a little more flexible.
Until now, Lite Books supported applying a discount to an entire invoice or quote.
You can now apply discounts to individual items, giving you more control over how you price your work.
For example, imagine you’re preparing an invoice for a customer that includes labour, materials and a call-out charge.
You might want to give the customer a discount on the labour but still charge the full price for the materials.
You can now do exactly that.
This works with quotes and invoices, including related features such as recurring invoices and converting quotes into invoices.
It’s a simple improvement, but one that should be particularly useful for businesses that provide a mixture of products and services.
Automatic Customer Statements
Customer statements are another area we’ve been improving this month.
If you regularly deal with customers who have multiple invoices, keeping everyone informed about outstanding balances can be time-consuming.
We’ve introduced an option to automatically email customer statements when there are outstanding invoices.
This means customers can receive a clear summary of what they owe without you having to prepare and send statements manually.
We’ve also made some improvements to how statements are accessed and viewed.
You can now download statement PDFs from within Lite Books, and customers can access their statements through their own customer portal.
We’ve also added date filters, allowing you to view statements for a particular period, and changed the statement history so the newest records appear first.
These improvements should make it easier for both businesses and their customers to keep track of outstanding accounts.
Automatic Payment Receipts
Another feature we’re pleased to introduce is automatic customer payment receipts.
When a customer makes a payment, it’s always good practice to acknowledge that the money has been received.
Lite Books can now automatically email a payment receipt to the customer whenever a payment is recorded, including partial payments.
This works whether the payment was made through an online payment provider or recorded manually.
For example, if a customer pays you by bank transfer and you record the payment in Lite Books, the system can automatically send them a receipt.
The email also includes a PDF receipt for their records.
This feature is enabled by default, but you can switch it off in your notification settings if you’d prefer to manage receipts yourself.
You can still send a receipt manually whenever you need to.
It’s another little job that Lite Books can take care of, giving you more time to focus on running your business.
Better Project Tracking on Invoices and Quotes
For businesses that work on individual jobs or projects, we’ve added some useful improvements to project management.
You can now link projects directly to quotes and invoices, helping you keep related paperwork together.
We’ve also added project start and end dates.
For example, if you’re a contractor working on several jobs at once, you can associate the quotes and invoices with the relevant project.
This makes it easier to keep track of the work you’re doing and the documents associated with each job.
Improvements to VAT Handling
We’ve also been working on how Lite Books handles VAT registration.
Not every business is VAT registered, and some businesses become registered as they grow.
It’s important that invoices and quotes accurately reflect the business’s VAT registration position when they were created.
Lite Books now records that information on the document itself.
This means that if you create an invoice while you’re not VAT registered, it will continue to reflect that position even if you become VAT registered later.
Similarly, documents created while you’re VAT registered will retain their VAT treatment.
We’ve also made sure that when you convert a quote into an invoice, the VAT position from the original quote is carried across.
These improvements are designed to make your records more consistent and reduce the chances of confusion when reviewing older documents.
More Reliable Dashboard Information
We’ve made a small but important improvement to the way overdue invoices are displayed.
Previously, the number of overdue invoices shown on the dashboard could sometimes differ from the number displayed in the invoices section.
We’ve aligned these figures so the information is more consistent throughout Lite Books.
It’s one of those improvements you might not immediately notice, but it helps make the app more dependable when you’re checking the state of your business finances.
More Options for Sending Emails
Email is an important part of Lite Books, whether you’re sending invoices, quotes, reminders or payment receipts.
This month, we’ve added Mailgun as another option for businesses that prefer to use their own email sending service.
Mailgun joins Resend as an available email provider.
Don’t worry if you’re not familiar with either of these services. You don’t need to set up anything extra to continue sending emails through Lite Books.
If you haven’t configured your own email provider, Lite Books will continue sending emails using its existing email service.
We’ve simply added more flexibility for businesses that want it.
New API Documentation for Integrations
We’ve also added a new API documentation section for businesses and developers who want to connect Lite Books with other software.
An API is simply a way for different software systems to communicate with one another.
For example, a business might eventually want to connect its own website, internal software or another business system with Lite Books.
The new documentation can be found under Settings → API Keys → Open API Documentation.
This feature is mainly intended for more advanced users and developers, so if you’re simply using Lite Books to manage your invoices and accounts, there’s nothing you need to do.
What’s Coming Next?
October has been a productive month, with improvements across payments, invoicing, customer communication, project management and VAT handling.
A lot of the work we’re doing is focused on the little things that make running a business easier.
Automatically sending a payment receipt, reminding a customer about an overdue invoice or keeping project paperwork organised might seem like small tasks individually, but they can add up to a lot of time over the course of a month.
And that’s really what Lite Books is about.
Less time spent on paperwork, and more time spent doing what you do best.
We’re continuing to improve the app, and feedback from our users plays an important part in deciding what we work on next.
If you have an idea, a suggestion or something you’d love to see in Lite Books, please get in touch.
Thanks again for your continued support, and we’ll be back with more updates soon!
The Lite Books Team
