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Administrator Guide
Last Updated: 2026-03-13
Steps: Write Off Receivables

Steps: Write Off Receivables

Workday enables you to write off customer invoices and customer invoice adjustments so that you can account for unpaid amounts. To post them to the appropriate ledger, create account posting rules to identify write-offs by the specified reason. You can:
  • Write off all or part of a customer invoice.
  • Apply multiple write-off reasons with different amounts for the same invoice.
  • Inactivate write-off reason that's not in use.
  • Write off small amounts during payment application but you can't add worktags.
  • Use the
    Submit Bad Debt Writeoff
     web service for bulk write-offs.
  • Create write-off rules to clear remaining balances after the automatic payment application process completes.
You can't write off invoices and adjustments:
  • During on-behalf-of payment applications.
  • When the VAT is in pending status due to the tax declaration run in progress.
  1. Access the
    Maintain Receivable Writeoff Reasons
     task.
    • Specify the reason and the usage of
      Customer Accounts
       or
      Student Financials
       to control the availability of the reason in the appropriate area.
    • When you change the name of a write-off reason that's in use, adjust account posting rule that refers to the old reason name.
    • To prevent selecting a write-off reason that's no longer valid for your organization, select the
      Inactive
       check box.
    Security:
    Set Up: Receivable Write-Off Categories
     domain in the Common Financial Management functional area.
  2. Access the
    Edit Customer Account Options
     task.
    • In the
      Copy Invoice Header Worktags to Write-off Lines
       prompt, select the invoice header worktags that you want to copy to the write-off lines.
    • To populate the balancing worktags in the write-off lines, select the
      Autofill Write-Off Lines and Balancing Worktags
       check box when you've enabled worktag balancing.
  3. Access the
    Write Off
     task from the related actions menu of an invoice.
    As you complete the task, consider:
    Some of the listed fields and functionality won't be applicable when you access write-offs through other tasks.
    Option Description
    Currency
    Workday automatically populates the invoice currency for a customer. When you don't specify one, it uses the company currency.
    You can change the currency to any of the accepted currencies defined for the specified customer. You can only select invoices and adjustments that are in the same currency as the write-off.
    Total Write-Off Amount
    You can enter multiple write-off amounts per invoice by different write-off reasons.
    To write off a portion of the invoice amount, change the value in
    Write-Off Amount
     to a value less than the
    Amount Due
    .
    Remaining Amount Due
    When you change the
    Write-Off Amount
    , Workday updates the remaining amount due.
    Write-Off Date
    Select a transaction date that's on or after the invoice date.
    Memo
    Specify any relevant information that you want to share with an approver during the review and revise process. This memo will also display in the journal line of the associated write-off.
    Write-Off Lines
    • (Optional) With the customer invoice write-off data entry check enabled on the
      Edit Tenant Setup - Financials
       task, Workday displays an alert to review the value entered in the
      Write-Off Amount
       field when the machine learning model determines that the value is outside historical data.
      Workday needs at least 100 write-offs with these matching dimensions applied in the past 12 months for the machine learning model to analyze the values entered in the
      Write-Off Amount
       field:
      • Company.
      • Cost center.
      • Currency.
      • Current user.
      • Write-off reason.
    • Workday displays the balancing worktags and the worktags that you've selected to copy from the invoice header. You can edit the worktags as necessary.
    Security:
    Process: Customer Writeoff - Core
     and
    Process: Customer Writeoff - Single Invoice
     domains in the Customer Accounts functional area.
  4. (Optional) Access the
    Bad Debt Writeoff Event
     business process.
    Configure the review and revise steps to route write-offs to the appropriate managers for approval.
    Security: Customer Accounts functional area.
  5. (Optional) Access the
    Find Customer Invoice Write-Offs
     report and specify the
    Company
     to which the write-off accrued.
    From the related actions menu of the write-off transaction:
    • Select
      Cancel Bad Debt Writeoff
       to cancel the write-off.
      You can't cancel write-offs that are part of customer invoice maintenance transactions or customer payment applications.
    • Select
      Add/Change Attachment
       to add or replace an attachment.
    Security:
    Process: Customer Writeoff - Cancel
    Process: Customer Writeoff - View
    , and
    Process: Customer Write-Off – Add/Change Attachment
     domains in the Customer Accounts functional area.
  6. (Optional) Access the
    Perform Customer Invoice Maintenance
     task.
    Specify a
    Transaction Date
     that's before any of the selected invoice adjustment dates. Workday automatically sets it to the current date.
    When you apply adjustments to invoices, you can also write off the small uncollectible amounts. But, you can't write off across more than 1 reason and can't include worktags.
    Security:
    Process: Customer Invoice - View
     and
    Process: Customer Writeoff - View
     and
    Process: Cash Sale Payment - View
     domains in the Customer Accounts functional area.
Create custom reports using the
Initiated By
 report field on the Revenue Reporting Transaction business object to view the initiator for the bad debt write-off transaction for the customer invoice.