Should revenue be recognized at contract time or at payment time?

What matters is picking one and sticking with it. To see cash flow, payment time is right; to see sales performance, contract time is right. Sprintingo recognizes revenue based on payment check-offs, and tracks sales performance separately by won contract amounts.

How many sales stages are right?

Four or five is often enough. More stages look more precise, but if people don't move deals, it drifts further from reality. You can change stage names and the number of stages on screen.

We don't want team members seeing contract amounts.

Screens with amounts are locked by permission. View, create, edit and delete are toggled separately per screen, so you can leave the sales pipeline open and keep contract amounts and the revenue dashboard closed.

Guide

Connecting sales inquiries to revenue in one line

If you're matching contract sheets against bank deposits every month-end, the problem isn't the sheet — it's that sales, projects and revenue live in three separate places.

Written 2026-09-22

The breaks always happen in the same two places

First, you create the project from scratch after the contract is signed. You retype the company name, amount and scope from the sales sheet into another tool. Terms get lost in the retyping, and later you end up asking the sales owner "what was the original amount?"

Second, payments and revenue are counted separately. The contract sheet has the money you're supposed to receive; the bank account has the money you did receive. Matching the two every month becomes routine, and it takes the most time while creating no value.

One sheet is doing three jobs

A sales sheet usually puts where a deal stands (stage), how much you agreed to receive (contract), and whether it actually came in (payment) in a single row. The three change at different times and are looked at by different people, yet they share the same cells.

So fixing one throws the others off, and anything missed only shows up at month-end.

The order to sort it out

01Fix the stages firstWrite down only the stages your company actually goes through, like inquiry · proposal · meeting · quote · contract. Go well past five and people stop moving deals. Agree on a one-line rule for when a deal moves on — if everyone moves deals at different points, the totals won't add up.
02Separate money owed from money receivedKeep them in the same cell and revenue gets inflated or goes missing. Leave the contract amount as the contract says, and record separately how much is due when for each installment.
03Pick one revenue recognition ruleDecide whether it's at contract or at payment, and don't change it. To see cash flow, payment time is right. Mix the two and the basis changes month to month, making comparisons meaningless.
04Make it so no one has to tally by handOnce it's sorted to this point, the totals should come out on their own. If someone is adding them up every month, it isn't sorted yet.

Sprintingo is built so this line never breaks

That's what the name means. When a request comes in, you put it as a card in a pipeline column, and move the card when the stage changes. Each column shows the count and total amount, and the server calculates the win rate.

A card in the Won column becomes a project with one button. The company name, amount and scope carry over as is, and sprints, kanban and a timeline are created at that moment. There's no retyping step.

Payments are checked off per installment. Check one and it counts as revenue for the month it was received; enter monthly goals and quarters and years are summed up and shown as achievement rates. Total contract value, amount received and outstanding receivables are always shown above the project list.

Request — Move it through stage columns; each column shows the total amount and days in stage
Won — One button turns it into a project, with sprints, kanban and a timeline created alongside
Payment — Check off an installment and it counts as that month's revenue
Revenue — See achievement against monthly, quarterly and yearly goals, with a breakdown by source

Common sticking points

Splitting stages too finely. Within two months, no one moves deals through a ten-stage pipeline. Split only as much as needed to record that a deal moved on.
Trying to move all past data. Moving even closed deals pushes back your start. Move only ongoing and open deals first.
Not deciding who can see amounts. Contract amounts and revenue aren't for everyone. It's better to decide first, screen by screen, who can see what.

Frequently asked questions

Should revenue be recognized at contract time or at payment time?: What matters is picking one and sticking with it. To see cash flow, payment time is right; to see sales performance, contract time is right. Sprintingo recognizes revenue based on payment check-offs, and tracks sales performance separately by won contract amounts.
How many sales stages are right?: Four or five is often enough. More stages look more precise, but if people don't move deals, it drifts further from reality. You can change stage names and the number of stages on screen.
We don't want team members seeing contract amounts.: Screens with amounts are locked by permission. View, create, edit and delete are toggled separately per screen, so you can leave the sales pipeline open and keep contract amounts and the revenue dashboard closed.

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