What a settlement is, and who's holding the money

• The two pieces of a booking's money

  Each booking's money is tracked as up to two pieces:

  • the deposit — collected up front when the booking is confirmed;
  • the remainder — the rest of the price, settled once the work is done.

  A booking with no deposit has only the remainder. A piece is only tracked once the money actually exists: the deposit once it's collected, the remainder once the session is marked complete.

• Who's holding it

  Every piece has a holder: the studio, the practitioner, or Needs filing — money that was collected but nobody has yet said who's holding it. The holder is simply who has the cash right now. It is not the same as who's entitled to keep it.

• Who owes whom

  InkMap works out who owes whom from the commission split — see Studio cut vs your net. While a card is still open, it's recalculated from the booking every time you look, so it always reflects the current arrangement. The moment it's settled, the split is frozen as it was agreed — so a finished settlement always shows what actually happened, even if you change that practitioner's arrangement later.

• When a card appears — and when it doesn't

  A card shows up only when money actually needs to move:

  • The studio is holding money the practitioner is owed (or the reverse) — a card appears so the holder can hand it over and the other side confirms.
  • The practitioner is already holding their own money and owes the studio nothing on that piece — no card.
  • The split comes out even, such as an independent practitioner with no studio cut — no card.

  That's why a deposit you collected yourself doesn't create a card, but a deposit the studio collected does.

• One card per booking

  Once a booking is complete, its deposit and remainder show as one net card for the whole booking — not a separate deposit card and balance card. The card carries the full breakdown (total price, the cut, who holds what) and the single hand-over that settles it.

• Recorded, then awaiting confirmation

  A settlement has two steps: one side records the hand-over, the other confirms it. In between, the card sits in an Awaiting confirmation state — still visible, not gone. For the side that recorded it, the money already counts as settled (it shows on their Accounting tab right away), so nobody is left waiting on the other person to keep their books current. A dispute is the only thing that reverses this: the card returns to the open list and the income is pulled back off until it's re-recorded.

• Looking back at a settled card

  Tap any settled card to expand its full trace: who collected the deposit and the remainder, the commission % that applied, who keeps what, who was holding the cash, and the actual amount that changed hands. These figures are frozen as they were agreed at settlement, so you can always verify after the fact that the money went where it should — handy if you ever think your wallet doesn't match the records.

Frequently asked questions

I collected the deposit myself — why is there no card for it?

The money is already in the right hands. A card only appears when one side holds money the other side is owed.

Why does a finished booking show only one card instead of two?

The deposit and remainder are combined into a single net card per booking once the work is done, so you settle the whole booking in one step.