The three records
| Record | What it is | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Customer | Whoever receives the invoice and pays it. | Lakeside Property Management |
| Location | A place you do the work. One customer can have many. | 1400 Lakeside Dr, Building C |
| Contact | A person you talk to at a customer. | Dana, the property manager |
The rule: follow the money
Before adding a customer, ask who receives the invoice and who pays it.
- One payer, several sites: one customer with several locations.
- Different payers: separate customers, even when they share a name, a manager, or a phone number.
- One person who handles several customers: one contact, linked to each customer.
Examples
| Situation | Add as | Why |
|---|---|---|
| A property manager with twelve rental homes | One customer, twelve locations | The management company pays every invoice. |
| A church with two campuses and one office | One customer, two locations | One office pays the bills. |
| A homeowner with their house and a rental | One customer, two locations | The same person pays for both. |
| Three franchise restaurants with one area manager | Three customers, the manager as a contact on each | Each restaurant pays from its own account. |
| Tenants in one building who each hire you | One customer per tenant | Each tenant pays their own bill. |
When it isn’t obvious
Make separate customers when their customer-level setup or balances need to stay separate:
- They need different billing addresses, payment terms, or tax-exempt status.
- They want a separate statement and balance for each site.
- Different people should only see their own invoices.
Billing contacts, invoice recipients and CCs, and purchase order numbers can vary by invoice; those differences alone don’t require separate customers.
Combine them into one customer when one check pays for everything and they’d rather get one statement.
What each choice changes
The customer holds everything about getting paid: the billing address, payment terms, tax-exempt status, invoice prefix, and, if you’ve connected QuickBooks, the QuickBooks customer it syncs with. Every location under a customer shares that billing address.
A location holds a label and an address. Each job uses one location as its service address, but the invoice shows only the customer’s billing address. Service plans are set up per location, so one customer can have a plan at each site.
Add a location to a customer
- Open the customer from Customers.
- In the Locations card, select Add.
- Give the location a label people will recognize, such as “North shop” or “Building C”, and enter the address.
- Select Save address.
To choose which location new jobs start with, or which one is used for billing, select Edit in the Locations card. When you create a job, choose the site under Service address.
The same person at several customers
Add the person once, then link them to each customer: open the customer, select Add in its Contacts card, then switch to Existing contact. If you enter the same email again, Stride checks for existing records and may offer Link this contact when the match is an unlinked contact or a person customer’s own contact. It shows up to ten matches, so the person you need may not appear; use Search contacts on the Contacts page if they’re missing. Already entered someone twice? Merge the duplicate contacts.
If you already set it up another way
Nothing breaks. Separate customers that share a payer keep working; each one simply gets its own invoices. Use the rule for new customers, and email us if you’re unsure about a particular one.