QR Codes — Complete User Guide — Two Accounts Web

Guide to adding a QR code to your business documents, choosing what it opens, sizing it for reliable printing, and printing documents in batches

Table of Contents

1. What the QR Code Option Does
2. Which Documents Support It
3. Turning the QR Code On
4. The QR Code Fields
5. Default Behaviour When QR Code Text Is Blank
6. Using Custom QR Code Text
7. Choosing the QR Code Size
8. What the Reader Sees After Scanning
9. Printing, Including Batches
10. Limitations and Notes

1. What the QR Code Option Does

Each supported document can carry a square QR code. When the document is viewed or printed, the code appears near the bottom of the page, and a customer who scans it with a phone camera or a QR scanning app is taken straight to the relevant page, dials a number, opens a new email, starts a message, or adds a contact — depending on what you put in the QR code.

The QR code is useful for:

• giving a customer instant access to their own copy of an invoice, quote, order, credit note or delivery note
• replacing a hand-written phone number on printed paperwork
• opening a payment or order page without typing a long web address
• letting a customer save your business details to their phone

2. Which Documents Support It

The QR code option is available on these fifteen document types:

3. Turning the QR Code On

1. Open the document you want to add a QR code to — for example a Sales Invoice.
2. Open the document and go to the Edit form.
3. Tick Show QR code.
4. The remaining QR options appear immediately underneath: Height, Width and QR code text.
5. Save the document. The QR code now appears when the document is viewed or printed.

To turn the QR code off again, untick Show QR code and save. The three options underneath are hidden again, and the code is removed from the printed page.

4. The QR Code Fields

5. Default Behaviour When QR Code Text Is Blank

When you leave QR code text empty, the program builds the QR code content for you. There are two possible outcomes, and the program chooses automatically.

5.1 Customer Dashboard Link — the Five Customer Documents

On a Sales Invoice, Sales Quote, Sales Order, Credit Note or Delivery Note, if the customer has a Customer Dashboard set up with the matching type enabled, the QR code contains the customer's own dashboard link to that document.

• Scanning it opens the document on a simple, clean page — no staff menus, no sidebars, and no password prompt.
• This is the option you normally want for a document a customer will receive.
• The link stays valid until that Customer Dashboard is changed or removed.

On the other ten supported documents — Purchase Invoice, Purchase Debit Note, Receipt, Payment, Goods Receipt, Inventory Write-Off, Production Order, Payslip, Expense Claim and Depreciation Entry — a Customer Dashboard link is not used, whatever the Customer Dashboard is set to.

5.2 Internal Document Link

The QR code contains a link to the document inside the program when either of these is true:

• the document is not one of the five customer documents; or
• it is one of them, but the customer has no Customer Dashboard, or the matching type is not enabled on it.

• Scanning it opens the document in the normal workspace.
• A staff login is required, so anyone scanning it is asked to sign in first.
• This is a sensible default for documents that stay in the office, such as Purchase Invoices, Purchase Debit Notes, Payments, Receipts, Payslips and Depreciation Entries.

5.3 Which Customer Dashboard Is Used

This applies to the five customer documents. If a customer has more than one Customer Dashboard set up, the program uses the most recently saved one that has the matching type enabled for that document.

Most recently saved means the dashboard you opened and saved last, whether you created it recently or simply reopened and saved an older one. If two dashboards were saved at exactly the same moment, the same one is chosen every time, so the choice is always the same for a given set of data.

6. Using Custom QR Code Text

Entering something in QR code text replaces the default link entirely. Whatever you type is placed inside the QR code exactly as entered, so you can make the code open almost anything a phone understands.

6.1 Saving a Contact

A QR code can hold a contact card. Enter it as a single line, using semicolons to separate the parts:

BEGIN:VCARD;VERSION:3.0;N:Acme Company Ltd;;;;FN:Acme Company Ltd;ORG:Acme Company Ltd;TEL;TYPE=CELL:+8801712345678;EMAIL:accounts@example.com;ADR:;;Dhaka;Bangladesh;;;;END:VCARD

Scanning this offers to save the contact to the reader's phone.

6.2 Rules for Custom Text

• Text you enter is used exactly as written, including capital letters and spaces.
• Use the full form, including https://, tel: or mailto:. A bare web address may be shown as text rather than opened.
• Do not wrap the value in quotation marks.
• For a telephone number, use the international format with a leading + and no spaces, for example tel:+8801712345678.
• Keep it short. Every extra character makes the code denser and harder to scan. See Choosing the QR Code Size.
• Text containing an & must be written as & if you are adding query details to a link.

7. Choosing the QR Code Size

The QR code is made up of small squares. On paper, each square needs to be large enough for a camera to recognise it. The more information a code holds, the more squares it needs, and the larger it must be printed to stay readable.

7.1 Recommended Sizes

7.2 Sizing Notes

• Enter the same value in Height and Width so the code stays square. A squashed or stretched code is harder to read.
• Size is measured on screen. When the page is printed, the code is scaled to fit the paper.
• When several documents are printed on one page, everything on the page is reduced to fit, so the QR code gets smaller on paper than it appears on screen. Allow for this by choosing a larger size.
• A code printed on a glossy or dark background is harder to read. Place it on a plain, light area of the document.

8. What the Reader Sees After Scanning

What happens next depends on what the code contains:

9. Printing, Including Batches

9.1 Printing a Single Document

Open the document and print it from your browser. The QR code is included and prints at the size you chose.

9. Batch Printing

You can select several documents of the same type and print them together, one document per page.

1. Go to the list of documents, for example Sales Invoices.
2. Tick the documents you want to print.
3. Choose the batch print option and confirm.
4. Each document appears on its own page, with its own QR code.

10. Limitations and Notes

• Custom print themes may not show the QR code even when the option is ticked if html is malformed and not formatted. If your business uses a custom theme, open a document and confirm the code is there before printing a large batch.
• Customer Dashboard links need no password. Anyone who has the link, or a photograph of the printed page, can open the document. If a document is confidential, use custom QR code text with a private link instead of the default link.
• Links do not expire on their own. A Customer Dashboard link keeps working until the dashboard is changed or removed. To stop a document being viewed through its printed code, change or remove that Customer Dashboard and re-print.
• The QR code appears once per document. If you need several different actions from one page, print separate copies with different custom text.
• Scanning results can differ between apps. A scanning app may present a link as text rather than opening it. A phone's built-in camera is the most reliable test.

End of QR Codes Guide