Glossary

A short reference for terms used elsewhere in these docs and in the app itself.

Walk-in customer — A sale with no customer selected. The default at checkout.

Credit sale — A sale where the customer takes the goods now and pays later. The amount owed is tracked against that customer.

Suspended sale — A sale you've started (added items to the cart) but paused before payment, so the till is free for the next customer. You can come back and resume it later. Sometimes called a "held" or "parked" sale elsewhere.

Quotation — A price estimate you give a customer before they commit to buying. It isn't a real sale yet — it becomes one when the customer accepts and you convert it.

Layaway — A sale where a customer pays a deposit to reserve goods and pays the rest by an agreed date, with the item held until it's fully paid off. See Layaway and deposit sales.

Price group — A named, separate price list you can apply to a sale — for example a Wholesale price list alongside your normal Retail prices.

Till (or cash register) — The record of cash in your drawer for a work session: what you opened with, what came in and out, and what you counted at the end.

Variable product — A product that comes in more than one option, like different sizes or colors, where each option can have its own price and stock count.

Reorder level — The stock quantity at which BusinessCopilot flags a product as running low, so you know to order more before you run out.

Stock transfer — Moving stock from one of your branches to another.

Stock count (also called a physical count) — Manually counting what's actually on your shelves and comparing it to what BusinessCopilot has on record, to catch and correct any mismatch.

Batch/lot — A group of stock that came in together and shares one expiry date, tracked separately so BusinessCopilot can warn you before it expires. See Batch/lot expiry alerts.

Opening stock — The quantity and cost of stock you already have on hand when you start tracking it in BusinessCopilot. See Setting your opening stock.

Goods receipt — The record of goods you've actually received against a purchase order, which is what updates your stock.

Landed cost — What a received item actually cost you once shipping and other purchase-related charges are factored in, not just its price on the purchase order.

Reconciliation — Matching your records against your real bank statement to confirm they agree, and catching anything that's missing or wrong. See Reconciling your bank statement.

Post-dated cheque — A cheque dated for a future day, tracked from when it's issued or received until it actually clears (or bounces). See Managing cheques.

Petty cash — A small cash fund, looked after by one person, for day-to-day purchases too small to bother paying by transfer. See Petty cash.

Receivables — Money customers owe you, usually from a credit sale that hasn't been fully paid off yet.

Payables — Money you owe your suppliers, usually from a purchase you haven't fully paid for yet.

Aging — How overdue an unpaid amount is, grouped into ranges like current, 31–60 days, and over 90 days — used for both receivables and payables.

VAT (Value Added Tax) — A tax added to what you sell. See Setting up your VAT rate.

Financial year close — A guided, once-a-year process that locks a completed year's books and carries its results forward. See Closing your financial year.

KPI — A target tied to a job position (not a person) that everyone in that position is measured against, feeding into their performance review. See Staff performance reviews.

Appraisal — A staff performance review, scored against their position's KPIs.

Payroll run — A batch of pay for all your staff for one period, moving through draft, approved, then paid — never paying out until you approve it. See Running payroll.

Lead — A potential customer you're working to turn into a sale, tracked through stages from New to Won or Lost. See Managing your leads and sales pipeline.

Customer segment — An automatic grouping of your customers — Loyal, At Risk, or New — based on their real purchase activity. See Understanding customer segments.

Loyalty tier — Silver, Gold, or VIP — assigned automatically based on how much a customer has spent with you in total. See Setting up loyalty tiers.

Connected account — A record of a social media account you use, tracked inside BusinessCopilot for reporting and campaign attribution — not a live login to that platform. See Connecting your social media accounts.

Discount rule — An automatic, scheduled promotion applied at checkout without anyone typing it in — different from a one-off discount a cashier applies by hand. See Setting up discount rules.

Drill-down — Clicking a summary number to see the real transactions that add up to it, instead of taking the total on faith. See Drilling into a number.

Prorated — A charge adjusted down to only the days left in your current billing period, instead of the full price — used when you upgrade your plan mid-cycle. See Upgrading or downgrading your plan.

Add-on — An optional extra module (like the AI Assistant) billed separately from your base plan, turned on or off independently. See Adding or removing add-ons.

Top-up — Extra AI queries you can buy once you've used your month's included allowance. See Understanding your usage.

Journal entry — A balanced record of one accounting event, with debit lines and credit lines that add up to the same total. BusinessCopilot posts one automatically for nearly everything; see How a sale or expense actually posts.

Chart of accounts — The full list of accounts your books are built from — every asset, liability, equity, income, and expense account BusinessCopilot can post to. See Understanding the Chart of Accounts.

General Ledger — Every posted entry for one account, in order, with a running balance. See Understanding the General Ledger.

Trial Balance — Every account's total debits and credits for a period, and the check that confirms they're equal. See Trial Balance.

Dimension — An optional reporting tag (Branch, Department, Project, or Class) attached to a journal line, used to filter or group reports — never required to post. See Understanding dimensions.

Undeposited Funds — A real, system-managed account that a card payment (or any payment not yet confirmed at a specific bank account) sits in until it's matched with your bank statement. See Understanding Undeposited Funds.

Accounting Integrity Exception — What BusinessCopilot calls it, on screen, when two records that should agree — a subledger and its ledger account — don't. See Reconciliation & Accounting Integrity Exceptions.

Clinical Suite — An optional add-on with patient records, appointments, follow-ups, reminders and Insights, for pharmacies and clinics. See What the Clinical Suite is.

MRN (medical record number) — The unique number BusinessCopilot gives every patient automatically, like MRN000042. See Adding a patient.

Provider — A team member who sees patients. They can be booked once they have a working-hours schedule at a branch. See Setting provider schedules and time off.

Follow-up — A task about a patient that isn't a booked appointment yet, with a due date, a priority and escalation. See Follow-ups.

No-show — A patient who doesn't turn up for an appointment. You mark it on the appointment, and it feeds the patient's no-show risk and your Insights. See Managing an appointment.

Sender ID — The name patients see on your text reminders (for example "GreenPharm"), which must be approved before texts go out automatically. See Patient reminders.

Waitlist — A list of patients who want an earlier appointment with a particular provider. You're alerted when a cancellation matches. See The waitlist.

Confirmation link — A private link in a patient's messages that lets them confirm or cancel one appointment, with no login. See The confirmation link.

No-show risk — A Low, Medium or High label on an upcoming appointment, with its reasons, based on the patient's history. A suggestion only. See No-show risk.

Utilization — How much of a provider's available working time was actually booked. See Insights.