You email a customer about invoice #1042.

They reply within the hour. “Which one? We paid you last week.”

They did pay last week. Just not for #1042. Three emails later, nobody is sure who owes what, and the money you were expecting on Friday is now a conversation.

A statement of account fixes that conversation before it starts. It’s a single document, usually sent monthly, that lists every invoice, payment and credit between you and one customer over a period, with a running balance at the bottom. One page. One number. No guessing.

Here’s how to use it properly.

What Is a Statement of Account?

Think of it as the whole relationship on one page. Instead of chasing overdue invoices one email at a time, you show the customer everything: what you billed, what they paid, what you credited, and what’s still open.

That’s the real difference between a pile of reminders and a statement. Reminders ask. A statement shows.

What Goes on a Statement

A useful statement of account has five parts:

1. Your business details and the customer’s name and account reference.
2. The statement period and date.
3. The opening balance carried from last month.
4. Every transaction in date order: invoices, payments and credit notes, each with its reference number and a running balance.
5. The closing balance, the due date and how to pay.

If you’d rather not build one from scratch, this statement of account template already has every field and the running balance formulas in place.

Statement vs Invoice: Why You Need Both

An invoice asks for payment for one sale. A customer statement summarizes all of them. You still send the invoice first. The statement comes later, as the reconciliation and the nudge.

Skip the invoice and there’s nothing to reconcile. Skip the statement and every unpaid invoice becomes its own separate chase.

Open Item Statement or Balance Forward Statement?

There are two common formats, and picking the wrong one causes more confusion than it solves.

The Open Item Format

This format lists every open invoice individually until it’s settled. If March’s invoice is still open in June, it’s still sitting there as its own line.

It suits businesses with a handful of larger invoices per customer, because the customer can match each line straight to their own records.

The Balance Forward Format

This one rolls everything from previous periods into one opening figure, then lists only this period’s activity underneath.

It suits high-volume accounts with lots of small transactions every month, like wholesale supply, where listing every open line would run for pages.

	Open item	Balance forward
Shows older open invoices	Individually, until paid	As one opening balance
Easiest for the customer to match	Yes	Harder for older items
Best for	Fewer, larger invoices	Many small transactions

If you’re not sure, start with open item. It’s harder for a customer to lose track of an invoice that’s still printed on the page every month.

A Statement of Account Example, Line by Line

Here’s an illustrative statement for one customer, a café buying coffee on 30-day terms, for September.

Date	Reference	Description	Charges	Payments and credits	Balance
Sep 1		Opening balance (INV-1031, due Aug 30)			$1,250
Sep 3	INV-1042	Coffee supply, September order	$1,800		$3,050
Sep 10	PMT-0877	Payment received for INV-1031		$1,250	$1,800
Sep 17	INV-1049	Coffee supply, top-up order	$950		$2,750
Sep 24	CN-0012	Credit note, damaged bags		$150	$2,600
Sep 30		Closing balance			$2,600

Look at what this does. The café can see their Sep 10 payment went to #1031, not #1042. The confusion from the opening email disappears in one glance. And the closing balance of $2,600 is a number they can approve without asking a single question.

That’s a statement of account sample doing exactly what it’s supposed to do.

Using the Accounts Receivable Aging Report to Decide Who to Chase

Statements tell each customer what they owe. The accounts receivable aging report tells you which customers to worry about first.

What is an aging report? It groups every unpaid invoice by how long it’s been overdue, usually in buckets of current, 1 to 30 days, 31 to 60 days, 61 to 90 days and 90 plus days.

Customer	Current	1 to 30 days	31 to 60 days	61 to 90 days	90+ days
Customer A	$2,600
Customer B	$900	$1,400
Customer C			$3,200
Customer D					$600

Here’s the chase order that table gives you. Customer C first: the biggest amount, already past 30 days. Customer D next: small, but at 90 plus days, every week makes it less likely to be collected. Customer B gets a friendly note. Customer A gets nothing but next month’s statement.

Without it, most people chase whoever they happen to remember. Usually that’s the wrong one.

Why Customers Ignore Statements (and How to Fix It)

If your statements get opened and filed without anyone paying, one of these is usually the reason:

1. They arrive on random dates. Send your monthly statement on the same day every month, so it lands when the customer’s finance team is already paying bills.
2. They don’t say how to pay. Put the due date and payment options on every monthly statement, even for customers who’ve paid you for years.
3. The overdue lines don’t stand out. Flag each past due invoice clearly. A customer skimming a page of numbers should still spot the ones that matter.
4. The numbers are wrong. Reconcile before you send. One missing payment on a statement and the customer stops trusting all of it.
5. Nobody follows up. Pair the statement with a short payment reminder email a few days later. Most unpaid invoices aren’t disputes. They’re just buried in an inbox.

None of this is complicated. It’s just consistent. And consistency is most of the collections process.

How Enerpize Handles Statements of Account

Enerpize is a cloud-based, all-in-one ERP platform for small and medium-sized businesses, combining accounting, inventory, HR, sales, and CRM in a single system.

For receivables, that means the invoices, payments and credit notes a statement is built from already live in one place.

Statements Built From Your Actual Records

Enerpize produces a client-ready statement from the invoice and payment records already in the system. There’s nothing to copy between spreadsheets, so the statement matches the books every time.

A Client Portal Where Customers Check Their Balance

Customers can log in to view their statement and pay invoices online. When the answer to “what do we owe?” is always one click away, fewer questions land in your inbox.

Automatic Reminders

Auto reminder rules send payment reminders on a schedule you set, using your own email templates. The follow-up happens even in the month you forget.

Payments, Credits and Currencies in One Ledger

Partial payments, deposits and credit notes all post against the right invoice, and invoices can be issued in more than 135 currencies. Every open balance shows up on the statement exactly as it stands.

Back to Invoice #1042

Same customer. Same Friday.

This time they don’t reply with a question. They open the statement, see their payment sitting against #1031, see #1042 still open, and pay the balance.

No thread. No confusion. No waiting.

That’s the quiet power of a statement of account. It doesn’t chase harder. It just makes paying you the obvious next step.

Key Takeaways

1. A statement lists every invoice, payment and credit for one customer over a period, with a running balance.
2. Send the invoice first. The statement is the monthly summary and the nudge that follows.
3. Open item formats keep older invoices visible. Balance forward formats suit high-volume accounts.
4. Use the aging report to decide who to chase first, by age and amount.
5. Consistent dates, clear payment details and a follow-up reminder do most of the work.
6. Keep your records. The IRS says to hold them for 7 years if you ever claim a bad debt deduction on an invoice that never gets paid.

Frequently Asked Questions

How is a statement of account used in accounting?

It’s a summary of all transactions between a business and one customer over a set period, including invoices, payments and credit notes, ending in the balance still owed.

What is the difference between an invoice and a statement?

An invoice requests payment for a single sale. A statement summarizes all invoices, payments and credits over a period and shows the total balance outstanding.

How often should you send a statement of account?

Monthly works for most businesses, on the same date each month. High-volume suppliers sometimes send them every two weeks.

How does collections work for small businesses?

It usually runs in stages: the invoice, a statement, a reminder, a phone call, and then a formal written notice if the balance stays unpaid. Every outstanding invoice should have a documented trail at each step. How long to keep those records depends on your situation, and the IRS recordkeeping guidance sets out the periods for US businesses.