Why is my FreeAgent income lower than expected?
The FreeAgent help pages give 3 common reasons. The first to rule out: Every new FreeAgent invoice starts as a draft, so an invoice that was never finished can still be waiting as a draft.
Is it broken, or just quiet?
A number can fall because fewer people came, or because something stopped counting them. Below are the causes the FreeAgent help pages give, and how to check each one yourself.
What causes it?
Every new FreeAgent invoice starts as a draft, so an invoice that was never finished can still be waiting as a draft.
In the FreeAgent help:
An invoice is always created with a status of `Draft`.
FreeAgent Developer Dashboard: Invoices, read 2026-11-12.If your business uses cash basis, income only counts once the customer's money arrives, so unpaid invoices do not show as income yet.
In the FreeAgent help:
where income is recorded when the money has been received from the customer.
Choose the appropriate accounting basis, read 2026-11-12.Income that you or your accountant deferred with a journal entry moves to a later month, so the month it came from can show less.
In the FreeAgent help:
You can defer income in FreeAgent by creating journal entries to move it forward from one month to another.
Accrue or defer income by moving it from one period to another, read 2026-11-12.
How do I check it myself?
List your draft invoices on their own to find any that were never finished.
In the FreeAgent help:
Show only draft invoices.
FreeAgent Developer Dashboard: Invoices, read 2026-11-12.Check which accounting basis your business uses. On accruals, income counts when it is earned, not when the money arrives.
In the FreeAgent help:
When preparing your accounts using the accruals accounting basis, income is recorded when the income is earned.
Choose the appropriate accounting basis, read 2026-11-12.
How would I know the day it starts?
- Feder reads your income from FreeAgent each day and compares each day with your own history.
- It tells you when income goes quiet or moves outside its usual range.
Some numbers are too quiet to judge daily, such as a form filled in a few times a week. Until there is enough of your own history to judge a change, Feder says it is still learning and scores nothing, rather than guessing.
See what Feder reads from FreeAgent, which feeds Money. Feder only reads. It never changes anything in FreeAgent.
What else goes wrong with these numbers?
- Why is my FreeAgent income higher than expected?FreeAgent
- Why doesn't my FreeAgent income match my card and online sales?FreeAgent
- Why did Google Analytics stop collecting data?Google Analytics
- Why aren't my key events showing in Google Analytics?Google Analytics
- Why does Google Analytics show (not set)?Google Analytics
See every question.
Where do these answers come from?
Every cause and check on this page comes from the FreeAgent help pages, quoted above with the date we read them. Last reviewed 2026-11-12. We read them again by 2027-11-12. If one changes, this page changes or comes down.