Selling online without a web shop: invoices and pay links
How a shop takes payment for WhatsApp, social media or e-mail orders with an invoice and a pay link, and releases goods only once payment is confirmed.
By Achekam · · 4 min read · For Retail businesses in South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya
A customer sends a photo of a dress from your Instagram page and asks if it comes in a larger size. Another messages on WhatsApp for two bags of cement to be delivered on Saturday. A school e-mails an order for forty sets of stationery. None of them will walk into the shop to pay, and all of them want the goods soon.
Many small shops sell this way without ever building a web shop, and the weak point is always the same: payment. Customers send screenshots of transfers that may or may not have happened, the shop loses track of who paid for what, and goods sometimes leave before the money arrives. This article shows how to handle these orders in Achekam with an invoice and a pay link, and where the commerce screens will not help.
The online storefront screen stores nothing
Achekam's commerce area has an online storefront screen. It stores nothing, and the screen says so. There is no web shop behind it that customers can browse, order from or pay through, and no orders reach the server from it.
So, for now, a shop selling online takes its orders wherever the customer already is, on WhatsApp, social media or e-mail, and handles the money through invoicing.
Click and collect and delivery modes at the till are labels only
The till has modes named Lay-by, Quotation, Sales Order, Service Work Order, Delivery and Click & Collect. These are labels only. Every till sale is recorded as an ordinary sale, paid in full, whichever mode is selected.
That means the till cannot hold an unpaid order for later collection, take a deposit for a delivery, or keep an order open until the customer pays. Do not ring up a remote order at the till and mark it "Delivery" in the hope that it will wait; the till treats it as a completed sale.
Issuing an invoice for the order
Instead, raise a customer invoice. A business creates invoices as drafts that can be changed or deleted, so you can build the order with the customer before committing to it. Issuing the invoice gives it the next number in your sequence and posts it to the ledger as debtors, sales and output VAT.
Write the invoice so the customer recognises the order:
- the items, sizes or colours exactly as agreed in the chat;
- delivery or collection, with the date;
- any delivery charge as its own line.
One accounting point to raise with your accountant. Only till sales and till returns move the inventory account in Achekam, so goods sold by invoice do not take their cost out of inventory automatically. If you sell stock this way regularly, agree how the cost of those goods will reach cost of sales at month end.
Sending the pay link with the invoice
For an issued invoice, you can create a payment link, copy it, or e-mail it with the invoice. The customer pays on a public page that shows your business's name and branding. An issued invoice can be downloaded as a PDF on your letterhead and e-mailed with or without the link, and a send that fails is reported as not sent.
For a WhatsApp customer, copy the link into the chat with a short message and the invoice PDF. For an e-mail customer, send both from the invoice.
A few details:
- There is no link for a draft or a voided invoice, so issue it first.
- A link lasts 14 days by default; the business can set anything from 1 to 720 hours.
- If an open link already exists for the same amount, it is reused rather than duplicated.
Pay links need a payment gateway. A workspace administrator enters the business's own gateway credentials in Settings, under Payment Gateways & Checkout, and can test the connection. If that has not been done, see setting up your payment gateway.
How a verified payment marks the invoice paid
When the customer pays through the link, the payment is verified with the gateway before anything is recorded. A verified payment is recorded as a receipt against the invoice, debiting that gateway's clearing account and crediting trade receivables, and the invoice shows as paid or part-paid.
Two protections sit behind that. The amount is checked against what the link asked for, and a repeated notification from the gateway never pays the invoice twice.
Why verification matters is well explained by the gateways themselves. Paystack's guide to verifying payments lists the statuses a transaction can have, from success to abandoned or pending, and explains why a business should confirm a payment before giving value. Achekam does that confirming for you; your part is to wait for it. The clearing account side is covered in online payments and the clearing account.
Releasing goods only once the payment is confirmed
The rule that protects a shop selling through chats is simple: release goods when Achekam shows the invoice as paid, not when the customer says they have paid.
| Customer says | What you do |
|---|---|
| "I've paid, here's a screenshot" | Check the invoice. If it is not marked paid, the payment has not been verified yet. |
| "I paid by bank transfer instead" | Wait until the money shows on your bank statement and record the receipt. |
| "I paid part now, rest on collection" | The invoice shows as part-paid; release only what your policy allows. |
| "The link expired" | Create a new link for the same invoice. |
A screenshot is easy to fake, which makes it a favourite trick in chat selling. A paid invoice in your own books is not. The same pay-link approach for professional deposits is described in taking a fee deposit by pay link.
Take the next order that arrives on WhatsApp, issue an invoice for it, send the pay link in the chat, and pack the goods only when the invoice shows as paid.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
