Cancel & restore an invoice
Cancel an invoice to void it and release its time and expenses. Restore brings it back as a Draft — without re-linking the original time entries.
Cancelling voids an invoice and frees up the work behind it. Restoring brings a cancelled invoice back as a Draft so you can fix and reissue it.
- Role
- OwnerAdminManager
Cancelling and restoring are manager-tier actions.
Cancel an invoice
You can cancel an invoice in any status except Paid.
Open the invoice
Open the Draft or Sent invoice you want to void.
Cancel
Choose Cancel. The invoice moves to Cancelled.
Cancelling:
- Releases linked time entries and expenses back to billable, ready to invoice again. See Invoiced & locked time.
- Revokes the public share token — the
/i/[token]page now returns a 404. See Public links & views. - Resets the sent and viewed timestamps.
- Keeps the invoice number burned and leaves the row in place for audit.
Paid invoices can't be cancelled. If money has changed hands, handle it through Refunds rather than cancelling.
Restore a cancelled invoice
Open the cancelled invoice
Open the Cancelled invoice.
Restore
Choose Restore. The invoice returns to Draft and is editable again.
Restoring does not re-link the original time entries. Because cancelling released them — and they may already be on another invoice — Hoursmith leaves them out to avoid double-billing. Re-run the entry selection in the draft to pull the time back in.
What happens next
- A restored Draft can be edited and sent again (a new share token is minted on the next send).
- The original invoice number stays retired; a freshly created invoice takes the next number in sequence. See Statuses.
Tips
- To change a Sent invoice's content, cancel → restore → edit is the supported path (or duplicate it instead).
- Cancel rather than delete when you need the audit trail; delete only works on Drafts.
Troubleshooting
- I cancelled but the client's link still works. Refresh — cancelling revokes the token; see Invoice link broken.
- Restored invoice has no lines. Expected — re-run the entry selection to re-add time and expenses.