At a Glance
- Partial invoice payments let you pay part of a wholesale or non-cannabis vendor invoice instead of the full balance
- The invoice stays open with a remaining balance and keeps showing in Payments Due until it's paid in full
- The vendor is notified automatically — partial amount paid, previously paid, and the balance still owed
- Check rail only: partials go out as digital or mailed checks, one check per payment
- Consignment settlements are excluded — partial payments are for wholesale and non-cannabis invoices
How Partial Invoice Payments Work
A partial invoice payment lets you pay part of a vendor invoice now and the rest later, without splitting the invoice or losing track of what's left. You'll use it on the Wholesale Payments and Non-Cannabis Payments tabs of your Payments page — any PO-backed invoice sitting in Payments Due.
When you send a partial, the platform issues a check for the amount you chose and moves the invoice to Partially Paid. The invoice stays open, the remaining balance stays in Payments Due, and the vendor gets a notification that spells out exactly what was paid and what's still owed. Nothing about the invoice is marked settled until the balance reaches zero.
Making a Partial Payment
Open the order you want to pay from the Wholesale Payments or Non-Cannabis Payments tab, and start a payment as you normally would. In the amount section of the pay dialog you'll see two choices:
- Pay in full — the default, sized to the remaining balance
- Pay a partial amount — enter any dollar figure and the dialog shows the remaining balance after this payment
Pick Pay a partial amount, type the amount, and the platform confirms the split before you send: how much goes out now and how much stays due on the invoice. Approve it and the check is generated like any other ShelfSpace payment. You can make as many partial payments against the same invoice as you need — the remaining balance updates each time.
What the Vendor Sees
Every partial payment notifies the vendor. The platform sends an email from your business — "{Your DBA} via ShelfSpace" — with a facts table that leaves no room for confusion about where the invoice stands:
A check for this payment has been issued — download it from your portal.
| Invoice total | $4,000.00 |
| This payment | $2,766.00 |
| Previously paid | $0.00 |
| Remaining balance | $1,234.00 |
The check is downloadable from the vendor's portal like any other payment, and the vendor also sees the invoice marked Partially Paid with the remaining balance on their side. The language stays honest — a check has been issued, not "you've been paid," because a payment isn't confirmed received until it clears.
Rules and Limits
Partial payments are deliberately scoped so a balance can never be overpaid or lost:
- Check rail only. Partials go out as Check 21 digital checks or mailed checks. ACH bank transfers aren't available for partial payments — pay in full to use ACH.
- Each partial is its own check. Every partial payment is a separate check and carries your standard $20 per-check fee, the same as any ShelfSpace payment.
- $1 minimum, and leave at least $1. A partial must be at least $1.00 and must leave at least $1.00 remaining. If your amount is within a dollar of the balance, the dialog steers you to pay in full instead.
- Credits apply at the close. You can't attach a credit memo to a partial payment. Apply credits when you settle the remaining balance. Any order-level credits already applied still reduce what's owed.
- PO-backed invoices only. Partials work on regular invoice payments — not ad-hoc payments, recurring payments, or scheduled payments.
Closing Out the Invoice
When you're ready to finish, pay the exact remaining balance. That closing payment runs through the normal full-payment path: the invoice flips to Paid, the delivery completes, and any credit memos you've been holding can be applied. Until then, the invoice keeps surfacing in Payments Due so it never slips off your radar.
Voiding works the same way it does for any check. Void a partial before the invoice is settled and the remaining balance goes back up automatically. You can't void a partial after the invoice is fully paid — void the final payment first.
QuickBooks Sync
Each partial check syncs to your QuickBooks Online account as its own bill payment, sized to that check. An invoice paid in three checks shows up as three bill payments, each pre-matched in your bank feed. Your books stay accurate to the penny without a single manual journal entry, and the running balance in QuickBooks matches what ShelfSpace shows.