Why am I asking
During the review of the translation of a software, in the context on an invoice, from English into Spanish I was puzzled by the translation of amount by the use of cantidad from the translator (which he most probably translated right), since I always thought an amount of money was translated as importe.
Do note that I am not a native English Speaker.
My research
According to Collins dictionary the translation for Amount of money is :
(= sum of money) "cantidad f", "suma f" " ⇒ a large amount of money" "una gran cantidad or suma de dinero"
(= total value) "valor m" a bill for the amount of "una cuenta por importe or valor de"
However the translation of Importe seems to be more related to a strict amount of money :
(= valor)
a. [de compra, gastos, cheque] "amount"
[...]
- (= coste) "cost"
Linguee translations for Amount of an invoice leans toward importe but for Amount of money towards cantidad .
My question
From what I read, I think cantidad is more a general word for amounts regardless of their types but that importe is a more specific term, but I could be wrong.
As a translation has more intricacies than plainly looking for words in a dictionary, I wanted to understand if I could use both as their meaning seem to be close.