When you merge multiple invoices, the new invoice always takes the number of the highest (most recent) invoice. Can this be changed to use the lowest (earliest) invoice? It doesn't make sense to do it the other way, as the customer probably has already been sent an email referencing the older invoice number.

I don't think the customer cares about an invoice number. I like it the way it is now. The latest sellings get the highest invoice number and the older ones are merged within this and so get the new, higher, invoice number. This is normal practise.

That isn't normal practice at any company I've ever worked for. If someone adds an item to an existing order, you don't open a new invoice, you add the new item to the existing invoice.

Chinacat,

I have had/seen both ways and I merely wanted to say it is a matter of custom or taste and AW choose this way. It is of no further importance to the program and/or customers and the first complaint about an invoice number of hundreds of customers I had meanwhile, business or not-business related, still has to come. I don't want to say you are wrong !
It might even so that you can do with AW as you propose but I have never tried that (I'll do it next it occurs). I wouldn't be surprised if you take the first/older invoice as leading and you merge the last invoice with that one it will do as you are accustomed to ?!

Cheers,
Howard
Wheel of Time
http://www.wheeloftime.nl

Let me know what happens, I'm too chicken to experiment.

My big problem is that once an item sells in an auction, I mark it with the invoice number so I can find it easily when I get paid (I have a couple hundred auctions running at once). If that same buyer buys another item (very common), I have to note the old invoice number before I merge them so I can find the first item, remark it, and place it with the new item. I don't want to have to go back to finding things by auction number, because it's much harder to deal with the extra digits.

I have had customers mention the invoice number change; I have also had them reply to the first email invoice I send them rather than the second, and then I have to do a search on auction number or email address to find the right invoice.

It would just be easier for me if a merged invoice kept the old invoice number.

Hi Chinacat,

Well, you can relax :-) I just had a couple of auctions ending and one of them was meant to be merged with an older one.
So what you do is just generate the new invoices and make sure the new ones do not get automatically merged with the old ones. That is easy as probably the old invoice will already have been marked 'Waiting for payment' and such invoices do not get merged automatically. Then you go to the old invoice and from this old one you choose 'Merge Invoice'.
Your just generated new one will show up and voilá, you have your old invoice number with all newly won items for that customer.
So the feature you want is already there, it is just a matter of which invoice you pick as leading before merging.
I hope this solves your problem !

Greetz,
Howard
Wheel of Time

I'll try it, but it's just as bad as what I'm doing now! Merging invoices is the first thing I do after generating invoices, and I use the invoices that have a status of "buyer not contacted' because I know those are the new ones. Now I'll have to look at all the 'waiting for buyer response' and 'waiting for payment' invoices. I guess what I'll do is still use the 'not contacted', make note of the old invoice numbers that need to be merged, then look those invoices up individually and do the merge. I'd much rather have a setting in AW2000 that lets me choose to always keep the earliest number when merging.