Deposits on Estimate Acceptance (Leads & Estimates)

Last updated July 6, 2026 · Admins and office staff

You can ask a customer to put money down when they accept an estimate. Depositing happens in the Customer Portal at the moment the customer e-signs — the deposit terms live on the estimate itself. This article covers setting up a deposit, the three deposit modes, what the customer experiences, and how a paid deposit shows up for you afterward.

Before you start

  • Stripe Connect must be set up and able to accept charges, and online payments must be enabled in Portal Settings. Without these, you can still save deposit terms on an estimate, but they won’t be chargeable — and at acceptance the system will simply complete the acceptance without a deposit.
  • Deposits are collected through the Customer Portal, so the customer needs portal access and the estimate must be visible to them (linked to their customer record, Estimates section enabled).
  • Set your default deposit terms once in Settings so every new estimate starts pre-filled (see below).

Deposit modes

Each estimate’s Deposit card offers three modes:

Mode What it means
No deposit Nothing is collected on acceptance.
Requested (optional for the customer) The customer signs and is offered the chance to pay a deposit, but can accept without paying.
Required to accept The customer signs and pays the deposit in one step — acceptance only completes once the payment succeeds.

The amount is either a percent of the accepted total (tax included) or a fixed dollar amount. It’s always computed from what the customer actually accepted, so if they drop optional lines, a percentage deposit scales down with the total.

Steps

Set company-wide defaults

  1. Go to Settings → Portal settings and find the Estimate deposits section.
  2. Choose the Default deposit mode, Deposit type (Percent or Fixed), and the percent or fixed amount.
  3. Save. These defaults pre-fill the Deposit card on every new estimate. Changing the defaults later never rewrites estimates you’ve already created.

Set (or override) the deposit on one estimate

  1. On the estimate’s Create or Summary page, open the Deposit card.
  2. Pick the mode, type, and percent/fixed amount for this estimate. This overrides the company default for this estimate only.
  3. Save the estimate. If online payments are disabled, the card warns you the deposit is saved but won’t be chargeable until you enable them.

What the customer sees

When the customer approves the estimate in the portal:

  • Requested — they e-sign, the acceptance completes immediately, and the confirmation page offers a “pay your deposit” option they can take or skip.
  • Required — after they type their name and sign, they’re taken straight to a deposit payment page. Their signature is recorded, but the acceptance isn’t final until the card payment succeeds. (If they abandon payment, they’re signed but “awaiting deposit”.)

Safety net at acceptance

The system re-checks the deposit right when the customer accepts. If the deposit can’t actually be collected — online payments are off, Stripe can’t charge, or the amount is below the minimum online payment — the deposit is quietly turned off and the customer is allowed to accept without it, rather than being blocked. When that happens, your operator notification says so explicitly (“the configured deposit could NOT be collected… acceptance completed without it”).

After a deposit is paid

A paid estimate deposit becomes an unapplied deposit on file for that customer — money received but not yet tied to an invoice. On the Estimate Summary, the Accepted selections card shows the deposit as paid with the date. When you later create the customer’s invoice:

  • The Invoice Summary shows a “Customer deposit on file” card listing the remaining deposit amount and which estimate it came from.
  • Click Apply to this invoice to credit it against the invoice balance (capped at the invoice’s open balance). It counts toward payment like any other.
  • If a deposit is refunded, the remaining applicable amount nets down automatically.

What happens next

Signature plus deposit turn an estimate into a committed job. Convert the accepted estimate to a job, do the work, then Convert to Invoice — and apply the deposit on file to that invoice so the customer is only billed the balance.

Tips & best practices

  • Set sensible defaults once. A standard percentage (configured in Settings) means every estimate proposes a deposit without extra clicks.
  • Use “Required to accept” for high-commitment work where you want skin in the game before scheduling; use “Requested” when you’d like a deposit but don’t want to add friction.
  • Confirm Stripe is live before promising deposits. If online payments aren’t enabled, the deposit silently won’t be collected — check the warning on the Deposit card.
  • Remember to apply the deposit to the final invoice, or you’ll double-charge the customer. The Invoice Summary surfaces the deposit-on-file card to remind you.
  • Percent deposits track the accepted total, so options the customer declines reduce the deposit automatically — no manual math.

Troubleshooting

  • The customer accepted but no deposit was taken — online payments/Stripe weren’t chargeable, or the amount was under the minimum. Check the operator notification and your Portal payment settings; the acceptance still completed.
  • Customer is “signed — awaiting deposit” — this is a Required deposit where the customer signed but hasn’t completed payment. Acceptance finalizes automatically once they pay; the customer can return to the portal to finish.
  • I don’t see the deposit on the invoice — the deposit-on-file card only appears on the Invoice Summary when the customer has an unapplied deposit. Confirm the deposit was actually paid (Accepted selections card shows “paid”).
  • Deposit fields are greyed out / not chargeable — enable online payments in Portal Settings and finish Stripe Connect setup.

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