Use the contractual due date to determine whether an invoice is current or past due when payment terms differ. Preserve the invoice date as a separate source fact for billing-process context and total elapsed time. Before comparing aging reports or prioritizing exceptions, record the report's aging method and confirm that due dates reflect the authorized terms in the accounting source.
Intuit's A/R aging guidance says the detail report shows individual past-due transactions and how long they are overdue. A QuickBooks Community explanation further describes aging as beginning after the due date, so invoices with different terms enter overdue status on different calendar dates.
Keep three dates separate
An invoice-level review should preserve:
- **Invoice date:** When the invoice was issued in the source.
- **Due date:** The date produced by the recorded payment terms or invoice entry.
- **Report date:** The as-of date used to calculate the current aging view.
A fourth operational date may be useful: the next review or promised-payment date. Keep it in the analysis layer. Never replace the ledger due date with a customer promise, because the two dates answer different questions.
Diagnose an unexpected aging bucket
If an invoice appears current or overdue when the team expects the opposite, review the source controls in order:
- Confirm the invoice date and due date on the source transaction.
- Confirm the payment terms recorded for the invoice or customer.
- Record the report date and selected aging method.
- Check whether the report uses current state or a historical as-of view.
- Identify later edits, payments, credits, or reopened transactions.
- Reconcile the transaction detail to the customer total before changing an action priority.
Do not recalculate due dates in the export merely because a customer usually pays on a different schedule. If the source terms are wrong, route the correction to an authorized accounting owner and create a new export after the source is fixed.
Use each date for the right decision
Due-date aging answers whether the invoice is contractually late in the source. Invoice age can expose a long billing-to-cash interval even before or after that threshold. Neither one establishes when cash will arrive. Forecast timing requires separate evidence such as a dated commitment, completed approval, resolved dispute, or observed payment pattern.
The aging limitations guide explains why aging buckets cannot supply owners, blockers, or expected collection weeks. The aging-versus-forecast comparison shows how source dates remain distinct from timing assumptions. Use the report-date checklist when comparing two exports.
Where AR Pulse fits
AR Pulse analyzes an authorized customer-provided QuickBooks receivables export. It preserves source-row traceability in the intended workflow and returns a ranked cash-action list plus a four-week collections forecast. It does not request QuickBooks credentials, edit terms, change due dates, contact customers, or promise collections. View the one-page example to see how ledger dates, evidence, next actions, and forecast assumptions remain separated.