---
title: "About Bills"
slug: "about-bills"
updated: 2024-03-18T20:13:59Z
published: 2024-03-18T20:13:59Z
canonical: "help.elorus.com/about-bills"
---

> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://help.elorus.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# About Bills

Business expenses typically refer to money spent by an organization in an effort to generate revenue. These may include outgoing payments such as travel expenses, rental payments, operational expenses etc., as well as purchases of goods and services from suppliers. Elorus comes with two distinct features to help you monitor all of your business expenses: **[Expenses](/int/docs/about-expenses)** and **Bills**.

## About Bills

Whenever you make a purchase, the supplier will typically send you a bill (e.g. issue an invoice) that represents an **obligation to pay** for goods delivered or services rendered. In Elorus, such documents are referred simply as **Bills**.

Working with *Bills* is similar to managing your [Sales invoices](/docs/about-invoices). You may [record a purchase invoice](/docs/add-bills) as well as the associated [supplier payments](/docs/bill-payment). You can monitor the **Bill payment status** and set [automated reminders](/docs/automated-reminders) to get notified for possible outstanding amounts.

Of course you may use the *Bills* functionality to track down expenses other than purchase invoices, such as travel expenses or office supplies. However, such expenses are typically paid upon receipt and managing payments manually will most likely add an unnecessary overhead. To manage business expenses via a simple and fast workflow, please see the **[Expenses](/docs/about-expenses)** feature.

## Bills and the Inventory

Bills can be associated with [Products / Services](/docs/about-productsservices) to denote a purchase of inventory items. Once [stock management](/docs/stock-management) has been enabled, Elorus will effectively **increase** the available stock based on the purchased quantity.

## Expense categories

Each time *Bills* are being recorded into the application, they must be associated with a corresponding **Expense category** to help you better understand your spending. Upon registering with Elorus, a wide selection of *Expense categories* has been installed into your *Organization*. Although this selection will cover most business cases, you may still [customize the available *Expense categories*](/int/docs/expense-categories) to suit your needs.

![Expenses by category report](https://cdn.document360.io/9493d4a2-f3a8-4344-ad47-a4f5aeb61ce6/Images/Documentation/expenses-categories-overview-int.png)

## Project expenses

*Bills* may optionally be associated with **[Projects](/int/docs/about-projects)** to access a clear overview of your project finances. Additionally, you may choose to automatically [bill your client with the expense](/int/docs/invoice-projects) the next time you invoice the *Project*.

## Receipts & other attachments

Attaching the received invoices or any other documents to your *Bills* is an easy and straight forward process. The attachments will always be available to your team online, and they can also be bulk-exported to a ZIP file, for the purpose of archiving.

## Additional tracking categories

Besides *Expense categories*, *Bills* may also be tracked by **any other property** your business needs dictate (e.g. purchases by work group). For more information see the article about **[Tracking categories](/int/docs/tracking-categories)**.

## Self-billed invoices

**Self-billing** is a commercial arrangement between a supplier and a customer in which the customer (you) prepares the supplier's invoice and forwards a copy to the supplier with the payment.

In Elorus, **[self-billed invoices](/docs/add-self-billed-invoices)** comprise a special form of *Bills*. For the most part they act like regular *Bills*, but they can also be exported to a PDF, as well as [be sent to suppliers via email](/docs/manage-self-billed-invoices).

![Issue self-billed invoices](https://cdn.document360.io/9493d4a2-f3a8-4344-ad47-a4f5aeb61ce6/Images/Documentation/self-billed-invoice-int.png)