Estimates

Estimates let you propose pricing to a client before committing to an invoice. Once accepted, an estimate can be converted directly into an invoice.

Creating an Estimate

When you create a new estimate, the system auto-assigns an estimate number from your settings.

Adding Items

Add items in two ways:

• From your product catalog — select a product and the name, description, price, and tax rates are auto-filled. Adjust quantity as needed.
• Custom items — enter a name, price, and quantity manually for one-off line items.

Each item shows a tax badge indicating its taxable status and tax category at a glance.

You can drag to reorder line items using the grip handle on each row.

Each item can have:

• Quantity — number of units
• Price — unit price (auto-filled from catalog or entered manually)
• Discount — optional per-item percentage discount (0–100%)

Customer & Contacts

Link the estimate to a trusted client to auto-fill the business name and choose from saved contacts. Or enter customer details manually.

You can add multiple contacts — mark one as primary to receive the email directly, with others on CC.

Discounts

Two levels of discounts are available:

• Item-level — percentage discount on individual line items, applied before tax
• Document-level — flat dollar amount or percentage off the subtotal

Shipping

Add shipping details if applicable:

Valid Until

Set a Valid Until date to indicate when the estimate expires. After this date, the estimate status can change to Expired.

Tax Exempt

Check the Tax Exempt box to exempt the entire estimate from tax. When enabled, the detail view and PDF show a “Tax Exempt” badge and the totals section displays “Tax — Exempt” instead of a tax breakdown.

Notes and Content

• Notes — internal or customer-facing notes attached to the estimate
• Content — additional content or descriptions for the document body

Terms & Disclaimers

• Terms — payment or validity terms (auto-filled from your invoice settings, editable per estimate)
• Disclaimers — select from your saved templates or write custom disclaimers for this document

Disclaimers are snapshotted when added — editing a template in settings later won’t change existing estimates.

Form Drafts

New estimates are automatically saved as a draft in your browser. If you navigate away before saving, your work is preserved and restored when you return to the create page.

Automatic Calculations

The system automatically calculates:

• Subtotal — sum of all items (after item-level discounts)
• Discount — document-level discount resolved to a dollar amount
• Taxes — broken down by tax rate, based on each item’s tax category and location
• Shipping — from the shipping cost field
• Total — subtotal − discount + taxes + shipping
• Cost — total cost based on product costs (internal only)
• Margin — profit margin percentage (internal only)

When you modify items, discounts, or shipping, everything recalculates automatically.

Sending an Estimate

When you send an estimate:

• A styled HTML email is sent to all contacts with a PDF attachment
• The estimate status changes to Sent
• The email includes a “View & Respond” button linking to a public page

The email is sent from your business name via Selflane, with replies directed to the email address in your invoice settings.

Estimate Statuses

Customer Response

Customers receive a link to view the estimate on a public page (no login required). From there they can:

• View the full estimate with all line items, taxes, and totals
• Download the PDF
• Accept — confirms the estimate and logs the acceptance
• Reject — declines with an optional reason, e.g., “Budget constraints — can we reduce scope?”

Converting to an Invoice

Once a customer accepts an estimate, you can convert it to an invoice. A confirmation dialog shows a summary before the invoice is created. See Invoices for details.

Duplicating an Estimate

You can duplicate any estimate to pre-fill a new form with the same items, contacts, and settings. This is useful when creating similar proposals for different clients.