I opened a case with NetSuite because I wanted to customize a credit memo. I was using vanilla credit memos, untouched, straight out of the box. However, when I printed a credit memo, it didn’t match the definition, which left me clueless trying to figure out what to customize.

Rule: Standard forms use basic templates, even if they claim to be using an advanced one.

This is highly illogical but true. Take note here in my situation, only one credit memo form exists, and it is the standard form.

When you click customize, you’d expect the form to be an exact copy of the standard form. Right? Not true! When you customize it, it switches from the basic to the advanced PDF/HTML template. This is very misleading!

So that peeled one layer off of the onion but still didn’t solve the problem of why my printed credit memo didn’t match the template.

So here’s a look at my preferred transaction template, the one it was actually using.

Customization >> Forms >> Transaction Form PDF Layouts

Here’s a printed version of a credit memo.

And here’s what the template looked like.

So why was it printing “Vendor Invoice To”, not “Bill To”, and where was the “Ship To” box? Well, here’s the reason. It’s well hidden.

Notice how the “Bill To” title has been switched to “Vendor Invoice To”. And notice how the “Ship To” box is unchecked.

Uh… Unbelievable!

So to solve my problem, I needed to create a custom Credit Memo Form and point it to a new customer Transaction Form PDF Layout. Then I can choose for myself what fields are printable and move them around as I see fit.

Hope this helps you save some time. I spent several hours on this myself and then NetSuite support didn’t get back to me for several days. Who knows how much time they spent on it.