Ambivo Books User Guide
DocsUG-001
Welcome to Ambivo Books
What Ambivo Books is, the dashboard, navigating the sidebar, key terminology
Ambivo Books is the accounting application inside the Ambivo platform. It is a complete double-entry bookkeeping system that lets you manage one or more sets of company books, send invoices, record bills and payments, connect your bank, and produce the financial statements your accountant or auditor expects. This guide introduces the application, the main concepts you will encounter, and how to find your way around.
What Is Ambivo Books?
Ambivo Books is a cloud-based accounting product designed for small and mid-sized businesses that have outgrown spreadsheets but want a simpler experience than traditional desktop accounting software. It is built on the same principles as QuickBooks, Xero, and Zoho Books — every transaction posts to a chart of accounts, balances are calculated from a permanent ledger, and at any time you can produce a Trial Balance, Income Statement, Balance Sheet, and Cash Flow Statement.
A few things make Ambivo Books different from those products:
- Built into the Ambivo platform — Customers, vendors, products, invoices, and payments flow between Ambivo CRM, Commerce, and Books without re-keying.
- IFRS and US GAAP-aware — You pick your accounting standard during setup. Reports follow that standard's structure.
- Multi-entity from day one — A single tenant can keep books for several companies, each with its own chart of accounts, currency, and reporting period.
- Multi-currency support — Each account, transaction, and ledger entry carries a currency. The base currency is set per entity.
- Bank feeds via Stripe Financial Connections — Live bank transactions stream in for reconciliation. No third-party Plaid account is required.
- International payouts via Wise — Pay vendor bills in any currency directly from inside Books.
- Read-only mode for QuickBooks customers — If your tenant is configured to keep QuickBooks as the system of record, Books shows your data but blocks edits. See QuickBooks Migration and Read-Only Mode (UG-090).
Who Should Use Ambivo Books
| Role | What you will do here |
|---|---|
| Business owner | Check the dashboard, review profit & loss, approve large payments |
| Bookkeeper | Enter bills, record payments, reconcile bank feeds, post journal entries |
| Accountant / controller | Adjust journals, run trial balance, close periods, hand financials to auditors |
| AR/Collections | Send invoices, record receipts, watch the receivables aging report |
| AP / Operations | Enter supplier bills, schedule payments, send international transfers |
Most pages are visible to anyone with access to Books. Specific create / update / delete actions can be limited per user — see Settings and Configuration (UG-080).
Key Concepts at a Glance
You will encounter these terms throughout the application. Each has its own deeper guide; the short version is below.
| Term | What it means |
|---|---|
| Tenant | Your organization on the Ambivo platform. A tenant can own multiple entities. |
| Entity | A single company or business unit that keeps its own books. Each entity has its own chart of accounts, transactions, and reports. |
| Chart of Accounts (COA) | The list of every account (Cash, Accounts Receivable, Sales Revenue, etc.) used to record financial activity for an entity. |
| Account | One line in the chart of accounts. Has a type (Asset, Liability, etc.) that determines its normal balance. |
| Transaction | A financial event — an invoice, a bill, a payment, a journal entry. Always touches at least two accounts. |
| Line item | One debit or credit row inside a transaction. |
| Posting | Recording a transaction permanently into the ledger. Posted transactions affect balances and reports. |
| Ledger | The permanent, append-only record of every posted debit and credit. |
| Reporting period | A fiscal year (or sub-period) used to group transactions for reporting. |
| Assignment / clearing | Linking a payment to the invoice it pays, so the invoice no longer shows as outstanding. |
| Bank feed | A live connection to a bank account that pulls in transactions for reconciliation. |
| Reconciliation | Matching bank transactions to the entries in your books. |
If accounting is new to you, start with Bookkeeping Concepts (UG-004).
Getting There
Ambivo Books lives at books.ambivo.com. You sign in with the same account you use for the rest of the Ambivo platform.
If your organization is new to Books and no entity has been created yet, you will land on the company setup screen the first time you log in. See Setting Up Your Company (UG-003).
If your organization already has at least one entity, you will land on the Dashboard.
The Dashboard
The dashboard is your daily summary screen. From the top, you will typically see:
- Welcome banner — A short greeting with your name.
- Quick actions — Shortcut cards for common tasks: Create Invoice, Record Payment, Connect Bank.
- Outstanding Invoices and Outstanding Bills — Aging summaries split into buckets (returned by the API as labelled bands).
- Income statement (MTD) — Month-to-date revenue and expense.
- Key accounting metrics — Total Assets, Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable.
Use the dashboard as a starting point in the morning, then drill down into the specific area you need.
Navigating the Sidebar
The left sidebar is your main menu. Items are grouped into two sections.
Primary section — daily operations
| Item | What it is for |
|---|---|
| Dashboard | The summary screen described above. |
| Accounts | Your Chart of Accounts. See Chart of Accounts (UG-010). |
| Invoices | Sales invoices to your customers. See Invoices (UG-020). |
| Bills | Bills you receive from suppliers. See Bills (UG-021). |
| Payments Received | Money coming in from customers. See Payments Received (UG-022). |
| Transfers Sent | International payouts via Wise. See Transfers Sent (UG-023). |
| Bank Feeds | Connected bank accounts. See Bank Feeds (UG-030). |
| Bank Transactions | Pulled-in bank lines waiting to be matched. See Bank Transactions and Reconciliation (UG-031). |
| Journal Entries | Manual debit/credit journals. See Journal Entries and Transactions (UG-040). |
| Transactions | The full transaction list across all types. |
| Reports | Financial statements. See Financial Reports (UG-050). |
Secondary section — masters and settings
| Item | What it is for |
|---|---|
| Customers | Your customer master list. |
| Vendors | Your vendor master list. |
| Products | Products and services you sell or buy. |
| Settings | Entity, currency, fiscal year, and security configuration. |
Some items (Accounts, Journal Entries, Transactions, Reports) only appear after the accounting module is enabled for the entity. If you do not see them, see the "Enable Accounting" card on the Settings page or read Setting Up Your Company (UG-003).
The Top Bar
The top bar gives you quick access to:
- Search — A search field for transactions, accounts, and other records.
- Current date — A small date readout for orientation.
- Notifications — A bell icon for system notifications.
- Your profile — Your name and email, with a Log Out button.
What Makes Books "Different" from a Regular App
If this is your first accounting product, three things will surprise you compared to a typical CRM or sales tool.
- Almost every action creates a journal entry behind the scenes. When you record a customer payment, Books debits your bank account and credits Accounts Receivable for you. You do not have to remember the debits and credits — but if you are curious, you can see them on the Transaction detail page for any record.
- Posted transactions are permanent. Once a transaction is posted to the ledger, it cannot be edited. To change it, you reverse it (with a credit note, debit note, or reversing journal) and create a new one. This is required for audit integrity and is not a bug.
- Time matters. Every transaction has a date. Reports are run for a date range or "as of" a date. Closing one fiscal period and starting another is a real event. See Bookkeeping Concepts (UG-004) for more on periods.
Common Questions
Do I need to be an accountant to use Ambivo Books?
No. The day-to-day workflow — sending invoices, recording payments, paying bills, reconciling the bank — is designed for non-accountants. The system handles the debits and credits behind the scenes. You will probably want an accountant to help with the initial setup of your chart of accounts, your fiscal year, and (if you are migrating from another system) your opening balances.
Can I keep books for more than one company?
The data model supports multiple entities under one tenant — each with its own chart of accounts, transactions, currency, and reports. The frontend today binds your session to a single entity at login (the first entity returned from /auth/entities); a per-session entity-switcher is not yet exposed in the UI. See Setting Up Your Company (UG-003) for how the model works.
Can I use a currency other than USD?
Yes. You choose a base currency when you create the entity. With multi-currency enabled, you can also record transactions in foreign currencies. See Multi-Currency (UG-070).
What if my organization uses QuickBooks as its system of record?
Some Ambivo tenants are configured with QuickBooks as the invoicing system of record. In that mode, Books shows your invoices and bills but blocks creates, edits, and deletes — so the books stay in sync with QuickBooks. See QuickBooks Migration and Read-Only Mode (UG-090).
Where does my data live?
Your books are stored in the Ambivo cloud (PostgreSQL). Bank feed data flows from your bank through Stripe Financial Connections into your books. Customers, vendors, products, and the master invoice/bill records are shared with the rest of the Ambivo platform.
Tips and Best Practices
- Set up your fiscal year and base currency before recording any transactions. They cannot be changed easily later.
- Enter opening balances once, at the start. Importing a Trial Balance from your previous system is the fastest way. See Data Import (UG-060).
- Reconcile your bank feed weekly, not yearly. It takes minutes when you do it often, hours when you wait.
- Don't post a transaction you are not sure about. You can save it as a draft, ask a colleague, and post it later. Once posted, it can only be reversed.
- Use the search bar. Typing an invoice number or customer name in the top bar is faster than browsing.