Late to send El Centro $3,000
Retainer draft is 5 days past its scheduled send
nine prior months went out on the 4th
Revenue / Billing Agent Drafted, reconciled, chased.
Drafted, reconciled, chased.
Never sent without you.
Assembles the invoice from approved time and cost, resolves the exceptions, and holds the draft until it reconciles to the contract.
Billing & Invoice › El Centro de Corazon › ECC26–05
Late to send Send history 8 of 8 months on time
Suggested actions pick one Octayne can do these — you approve
Send El Centro retainer now Octayne recommends $3,000
Sends to billing@elcentro.org. Matches the 9-month pattern; the client expects it.
What this action includes
Tobilling@elcentro.org SubjectInvoice ECC26–05 · Leadership Workshop Retainer
| Line item | Qty | Rate | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly retainer · May 2026 | 1 | $3,000 | $3,000.00 |
| Total | $3,000.00 |
Net-30. Payment due Jun 8, 2026. Pre-approved template; no rate changes.
Hold the draft and note a reason
Pauses the invoice, logs the hold, and surfaces it again tomorrow.
1 of 2 actions queued
Save draft ✓ Apply 1 action
The problem
Why this goes wrong today.
- 01 The draft is rebuilt every month
Approved time is exported, the contract is applied by hand, and the same reconciliation is repeated from the beginning.
- 02 Review finds nothing until the client does
Internal checks look at the total. Disputes come from a line — a rate that did not match, an expense that was never billable.
- 03 Every dispute costs thirty days
The invoice goes back, the cycle restarts, and the cash arrives a month after the work was already paid for in salary.
How it works
What it actually does.
- 01 Draft on the cadence each client bills to Monthly, quarterly, milestone or retainer. Approved time, expense, vendor cost and any fee schedule, assembled against that engagement’s template.
- 02 Apply the contract Rate cards, caps, discounts, retainers, not-to-exceed clauses and billing increments — as they are written for this client.
- 03 Reconcile before it leaves The draft is checked back against the contract and the engagement budget. A draft that does not reconcile does not become an invoice.
- 04 Watch what ages, drifts or diverges Drafts past their send date, approved time aging toward write-off, retainers billing below their baseline, QuickBooks amounts that no longer match, and collections past terms.
One cycle: everything it cleared, and everything it will not send
A morning: 8 invoices drafted, 145h allocated, 23 reconciled against QuickBooks, 2 reminders out. Five things reach a human — a late retainer, stale time aging toward write-off, a 75-day collection, a QuickBooks edit and a drifted retainer.
Billing cycle · 14 May
Handled without you
8 invoices drafted $147k · none sent
145h time allocated across 12 invoices · $42.3k
23 QuickBooks synced amounts and dates reconciled
2 reminders sent pre-approved templates only
Needs your call 5
Underbilled Atlas Components $22.1k
78h of approved time is over 60 days old and unallocated
leakage risk — I drafted a catch-up
Collection SummitCare $44.8k
75 days overdue on a client that pays in 27
auto-reminders exhausted
QB sync Beacon Retail +$823
Invoice total was edited in QuickBooks
not on any of our entries
Retainer drift HarborPoint $12.2k
Draft came in 39% below a nine-month flat retainer
quiet month, or underlogged
It drafts, allocates, reconciles and chases. It never sends — a back-bill, a drifted retainer or an edit it did not make are all conversations, so they reach you first.
QuickBooks, both directions
Accounting and delivery, holding the same number.
Invoices, payments, vendor bills and card spend are pulled from QuickBooks as they post — and attributed to the approved time, the workstream and the margin they belong to. Two-way, continuously, with nobody keying anything.
QuickBooks Two-way · Online
Connected · last sync 4 min ago Out of QuickBooks Attributed in Octayne
Invoice 1042 $18,400
Gridline Energy Partners Sent 12 May 78.5h of approved time Matched
Gridline Advisory — Phase I · ADV-204 Payment received $18,400
Gridline Energy Partners Cleared 09 Jun Clears AR in full Matched
Days to pay 28 · under the 45-day target Vendor bill $6,250
Trellis Data Due 30 Jun Subcontractor cost, Phase I Matched
Counted against margin the day it posts, not at close Card expense $412
Ramp · travel 14 May No engagement on the receipt For review
Two candidates within the date range — needs a person
Invoices, payments, bills and card spend are pulled as they post and attributed to
the approved time and the workstream they belong to. Delivery and the ledger stay
the same number — nobody reconciles them at month end.
23 documents this cycle
21 attributed automatically
2 waiting on a human
0 keyed by hand
Pulled as they post
Not a nightly export of totals. Each document arrives with its counterparty, amount and date, and is matched while the period is still open.
Attributed, not just imported
An invoice lands against the approved hours behind it. A vendor bill lands against the workstream it was incurred for, so it hits margin the day it posts rather than at close.
What it cannot match, it shows you
A receipt with no engagement on it goes to a person, with the candidates listed.
Inputs and outputs
What it reads, and what it does.
What it reads Everything it is given access to.
- Approved time and expense
- Vendor and subcontractor cost
- Contract terms, rate cards and fee schedules
- The QuickBooks ledger, two-way
What it derives The signals it builds from that.
- What is past its send date
- What is aging toward write-off
- Where QuickBooks has drifted
What it does with it The action each signal triggers.
- Drafts on each client cadence
- Chases collections
- Holds anything it will not decide
What reaches a human
It never sends an invoice. Drafts are prepared, reconciled and queued, but a back-bill, a retainer that has drifted below baseline, or a QuickBooks edit it did not make are all conversations with a client or a colleague — so they reach you first.
Next step
See it run against one of your live engagements.
Bring an engagement that worried you. We will show you where the margin went, and the week Octayne would have told you.