Just gone self employed
How to invoice as a sole trader in the UK
You did the work, the customer is happy, and now you have to ask for the money. A sole trader invoice is a short, plain document. Nobody needs a letterhead or a clever layout. Here is what goes on it, and a worked example you can use tonight.
What a sole trader invoice has to show
You are not a limited company, so there is no company number and no registered office to print. What a customer and HMRC both want is a clear record of who did what, for whom, and for how much.
- The word invoice. Not statement and not receipt. A receipt says the money arrived. An invoice asks for it.
- Your own name and your trading name. If you trade under a business name, show both. The legal one is yours.
- Your address, a phone number and an email address. That is enough.
- The customer name and address, and the site address as well if you worked somewhere else.
- An invoice number, one per invoice and never reused.
- The date you raised it, and the date of the work if that was a different day.
- What you did, with labour and materials on their own lines. One lump sum invites a phone call.
- The amount owed and when you want it, written as a date.
- How to pay you. Sort code, account number, account name, and a request to use the invoice number as the reference.
A worked example
One day of work for a household customer, with the bits bought on your own account.
| Labour, one day | £240 |
|---|---|
| Materials | £160 |
| Total to pay | £400 |
Underneath it goes one line of bank details and the reference 2026-014. Then keep your own version, because that is what the tax return is built from.
The app fills an invoice like that one in from the job, number and dates included.
Start freeNumbering matters more than it looks
Hand the numbers out in order and never skip one. The year and a running count is enough, so 2026-001 then 2026-002. When money lands in your account the number is how you know what it paid. When your tax return is due, a gap in the run is how you spot the invoice you forgot to raise. The same number used twice is an afternoon of guessing.
Payment terms
Say when you want paying, on the invoice, in words. Fourteen days is normal for a household customer and thirty days is normal for a business.
Write the actual date rather than the number of days. Due by 4 November is clearer than due in 14 days, and far harder to argue with. You are allowed to charge interest on a late commercial invoice, but for most one person businesses a reminder on the day and a phone call a week later brings the money in faster than a penalty does.
When VAT comes into it
If you are not VAT registered, do not mention VAT anywhere on the invoice. No VAT line, no VAT number, and nothing hinting that your price includes some. Charging VAT you are not registered for is the one invoicing mistake that gets genuinely expensive.
Once your turnover for the last twelve months passes the registration threshold you have to register. After that every invoice needs your VAT number, the rate, the VAT amount and the total. The threshold changes, so read the current one on the HMRC website rather than trusting a figure typed on a page like this.
Subcontracting in construction is a different world again, because a deduction comes off your labour before you are paid and the invoice has to show it. The CIS invoice template page works that one through.
Doing all that without typing it
Every rule above is a form you could fill in by hand. What people dread is not the form. It is filling the form in at nine at night from memory, for the fourth time that week.
DRSaaS is the everything app for trades and home businesses, and the invoice falls out of the job. You book the work, you fill the sheet in while you are still on site, and the draft is written from what the job already knows. You read it and tap send.
Your numbering, your dates and your payment terms are set once. Every invoice after that comes out right without you thinking about it.
Nothing reaches a customer until you have read it. For the longer argument there is the invoice app for tradesmen page, and the CRM for a home service business page covers the rest of the admin.
What it costs
No card. No trial clock. Free for every business until 500 are active on it. After that it is £49 a month for one person, and no account pays anything without 90 days written notice first. Your first 12 months are free whatever happens.
Start free