Video production invoice template (and how to get paid on time)
Most people searching for a video production invoice template are not looking for accounting theory. They have finished the job, the client has the files, and they want to send something that a finance department will pay without three rounds of emails. So here is the template we use, block by block, plus the parts that actually decide whether you get paid on time - line items, deposits, terms, and what to do when it goes past due. We are a working crew rather than accountants, so treat this as a practical starting point and check anything tax-shaped with someone qualified.
What has to be on it
An invoice is a demand for payment, and in the UK a handful of things need to be on it for it to function as a business record: who you are, who the client is, a unique invoice number, the date it was issued, the date the work was supplied, a clear description of what was supplied, and the amount owed. If you are VAT registered there is more - your VAT number, the rate applied, and the VAT amount shown separately - and if you are not registered, you simply do not mention VAT at all. Charging it before you are registered is the one genuinely expensive mistake on this page.
The template, block by block
- Header - your trading name, address, email, and company number if you are a limited company. VAT number if registered.
- Invoice number and dates - a number that never repeats and never goes backwards, the issue date, the supply date, and the due date written out in full rather than left as a calculation.
- Bill to - the client's registered billing name and address, not the marketing contact's name. Add the purchase order number if they use one; without it, larger clients will not pay.
- Line items - what was supplied, itemised, with amounts. More on this below, because it is the block that gets invoices queried.
- Totals - net, VAT if applicable, then the amount due. If there was a deposit, show it as a deduction on its own line so the balance is obvious.
- How to pay - terms, bank name, account number and sort code, the reference you want them to quote, and one short line about late payment.
Line items a client can actually approve
The person paying you is usually not the person who hired you. They are in finance, they have the purchase order in front of them, and they are checking whether your invoice matches it. So write line items that map onto what the client agreed to, in the same words. If the quote said one shoot day and an edit with three cutdowns, the invoice says one shoot day and an edit with three cutdowns - not "production services", and not a single line saying "as discussed".
Two habits save the most time. Itemise anything that could look like a surprise - travel, parking, a second camera, licensed music - even when it is small, because an unexplained £50 will hold up £2,000. And bill extra work as its own line with a date attached, so the fourth round of amends the client asked for on the 12th appears as exactly that rather than as an inflated edit fee. If you agreed the scope properly at the start, this is nearly automatic; our video brief template exists mostly so the deliverables list you quote against is the same list you invoice against.
Deposits, stage payments and terms
For a single day with a client you have worked with, invoicing everything on delivery is fine. For anything larger, or anyone new, split it: fifty per cent on booking and the balance on delivery is the standard shape and almost nobody argues with it. The deposit is not distrust, it is the days you have stopped selling to anyone else. It also tells you something early - a client who will not pay a deposit is rarely a client who pays quickly afterwards.
Thirty days from the invoice date is the norm for UK commercial work, and most corporate finance runs are monthly, so an invoice sent on the 2nd and an invoice sent on the 28th can land in the same payment run or a month apart. Send it the day you deliver. Put the terms on the quote as well as the invoice so they are agreed rather than announced, and keep the reference consistent across the deposit and the balance.
When it goes past due
Assume the first overdue invoice is an oversight, because it usually is. A short email a few days after the due date, to the finance address rather than your contact, with the invoice attached again and the PO number in the subject line, clears most of them. If that does nothing, go back to the person who hired you - they can walk down the corridor, and they would rather do that than have the next job stall.
Beyond that, the UK gives you real leverage that small crews rarely use. Under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 you can charge statutory interest of eight per cent above the Bank of England base rate on a late business invoice, plus fixed compensation depending on the size of the debt. You will not often invoke it. Having one line on the invoice saying that you may is enough to move you up a payment run, and it costs nothing to include.
The part that actually goes wrong
Honestly, the template is the easy half. What goes wrong for small crews is not the layout, it is the week between delivering the films and getting round to raising the invoice, and the moment three months later when you cannot remember whether the extra half day was ever billed. Numbers drift out of sequence because two of you invoice from different files. The PO number is in an email thread rather than on the job.
That is why Cinella keeps invoices on the shoot rather than in a separate folder: the job details you already entered for the call sheet and the run of day are what the invoice is built from, numbering stays in one sequence, and you can see at a glance which shoots have been billed and which have not. We built it because we kept losing money in exactly that gap, so take the bias as read. It is £19 a month, or £190 a year with two months free - keep your rate for as long as you stay subscribed - with a 14-day free trial and nothing charged if you cancel inside it.
The template above works in any accounting tool, or in a spreadsheet, or in a document you copy each time. Six blocks, line items that match the quote, terms agreed up front, and the invoice sent on the day you deliver.