Perhaps you’ve been asked to do a bit of freelance work because of how amazing your blog is, or maybe you need to send an invoice for a sponsored post you’ve done (it’s useful to do when you need to chase someone up for a payment they promised!). No matter what the reason, an invoice in the UK will look pretty much the same whether you’re a sole trader or a big company.
You could open an invoice template in Word or whatever word processing package you use, or you could just open a blank document up and create your own template (how much of a perfectionist are you?) All invoices in the UK must contain the following:
- The word “invoice” on the invoice…just incase someone doesn’t know what they’re looking at!
- A unique identification number for the invoice – it’s not just for your benefit, but for the company that is paying you.
- Your name, address and contact information – sounds really obvious, but you’d be surprised how many companies don’t bother to put that info on!
- The (company) name and address of the customer you are invoicing.
- A clear description of what you are requesting payment for (If you’re requesting payment for a specific blog post, then include the link in the description. This will be helpful for the customer at the end of the year!)
- The date of when the items you are requesting payment for were completed (Again, if it’s a blog post, then include the date the post was published)
- The date of the invoice
- The amounts being charged per line item (for example, perhaps you charge £5 a photograph, and there were 3 photographs. You would put 3 x Photographs @ £5/ea – £15)
- The total amount of the invoice
If you have set up a limited company for your blog stuff, then you’ll also need these things on the invoice
- Your company registration number
- Your company’s registered office
- Your company’s full name as it appears on the certificate of incorporation (you might choose to use a different company name so you would need to show this as [company A] trading as [company B])
- If you include the directors of the company name’s on the invoice, you must include all their names
If you need any more help with this, let us know!
