Autofid Invoice Configuration: How to Control Every Field on Every Document Your Business Generates

Every document your business issues to a customer — a sales invoice for a vehicle purchase, a service receipt for a workshop job, a deposit note for a reservation — is a legal record, a brand statement, and a communication tool simultaneously. A poorly configured invoice that omits critical information creates compliance risk. One that includes fields irrelevant to your business type creates confusion. And one that looks inconsistent or unprofessional undermines the trust you have built with your customers.

Autofid's Invoice Configuration system gives you granular control over exactly which fields appear on each type of document your business generates — without requiring any technical knowledge or template editing. This guide walks through every aspect of invoice configuration and explains how to set up each document type to match your business's legal requirements, operational workflow, and professional standards.

Understanding Invoice Types in Autofid

Autofid generates several distinct document types, each for a different commercial transaction. The Invoice Configuration settings apply independently to each type — so your vehicle sales invoice can show different fields from your service job invoice, while your deposit notes carry their own distinct field set.

The available document types depend on your business type configuration:

If your account is configured as a Dealership, you see only the vehicle-related document tabs. If configured as a Garage, you see only the service-related tabs. If configured as Both, all tabs are available — allowing independent field configuration for every document type your business uses.

Field Groups: How Invoice Content Is Organised

Within each document type, the configurable fields are organised into Field Groups — logical sections that correspond to distinct sections of the printed or PDF document. Common field groups across document types include:

Business Information Group

Fields relating to your business as the issuer of the document:

• Business name and trading name
• Registered address
• VAT registration number
• Company registration number
• Phone number and email address
• Logo (displayed at the top of the document)

Customer Information Group

Fields relating to the customer receiving the document:

• Customer name (first name, last name, or full company name)
• Customer address
• Customer VAT number (for B2B transactions)
• Customer email and phone

Vehicle Information Group

For vehicle-related documents, fields relating to the specific vehicle:

• Registration number
• Make and Model
• Year of manufacture
• VIN (Vehicle Identification Number)
• Colour, fuel type, transmission
• Odometer reading at time of sale

For accounts configured as Garage (where workshop jobs may involve external customer vehicles rather than stock vehicles), the vehicle group shows external vehicle fields (registration entered manually) rather than linked stock vehicle fields. Autofid filters the available fields automatically based on your business type — preventing irrelevant options from cluttering your configuration.

Financial Summary Group

Fields relating to the monetary transaction:

• Invoice subtotal (ex. VAT)
• VAT breakdown by rate
• Total gross amount
• Deposit received (where applicable)
• Balance due
• Payment method
• Payment terms

Document Reference Group

Administrative fields for document tracking:

• Invoice or deposit note number (sequential)
• Issue date
• Due date (for credit terms)
• Internal reference or purchase order number

Toggling Fields: The Core Configuration Action

For each field within each field group, Autofid gives you a simple on/off toggle. When a field is toggled on, it appears on the generated PDF. When toggled off, it is omitted from the document entirely.

This toggle system means you can precisely control the information density of each document. A sole-trader garage serving private customers might turn off the customer VAT number field (irrelevant for private individuals) and the company registration number field (not applicable to private customers). A dealership selling to fleet buyers and businesses might turn both fields on — because corporate customers need those details on their purchase invoice for their own accounting.

Defaults vs Overrides

Autofid's field configuration operates on a defaults and overrides model. System-level defaults are pre-configured to show the most commonly required fields for each document type. When you toggle a field, you create an override — a setting specific to your account that departs from the default. The interface clearly distinguishes between default settings and your custom overrides, and provides a Reset Tab function that reverts any document type back to its default configuration — useful if you experiment with a configuration and want to start fresh.

Document Policies: Rules That Govern Document Behaviour

Beyond individual field visibility, each document type in Autofid also has configurable Document Policies — rules that govern how the document behaves, what mandatory content it must contain, and how it is formatted. Document policies sit below the field group toggles on each tab.

Common Document Policy Options

Document policies are the place to add legally required content that must appear on every invoice — for example, a vehicle dealership may be legally required to include specific consumer protection statements on all retail sales invoices. Configuring this in the Document Policies section ensures it appears automatically on every document generated, without relying on anyone remembering to add it manually.

Saving, Discarding, and Resetting Configuration

The Invoice Configuration interface tracks unsaved changes with a dirty state indicator — showing a Discard Changes button alongside the Save button whenever you have made modifications that have not yet been saved. This prevents accidental navigation away from the page causing lost configuration work.

• Save — Commits your current field toggles and document policy entries to your account configuration. All new documents generated after saving will reflect the updated settings.
• Discard Changes — Reverts the current view to the last saved state, abandoning any unsaved toggles or policy edits.
• Reset Tab — Available per document type, this resets all fields on the current tab back to the system default configuration. Use this if your current overrides have become inconsistent and you want to start clean with a solid baseline.

"Invoice configuration is a one-time setup task that pays dividends every day. Getting it right at the start means every document your business generates is automatically correct — compliant, professional, and containing exactly the information your customers and your accountant need. There is no ongoing manual effort required once it is configured."

Invoice Configuration Checklist for New Autofid Accounts

Use this checklist to ensure your invoice configuration is complete before issuing your first real document: