What an order is
A purchase order tells a supplier what you will buy and at what price. It does not change the books or the stock. What it does is keep a list of what is still to be received or invoiced, so a goods received note or an invoice can be made from it without retyping.
Open Purchase order (menu Purchase Entries). The Status is Not used, Used on grn, Used on bill, Expired or Cancelled; where your company uses approval, an approved tag sits beside it. The tiles show the Total purchase order, Total invoiced order and Total outstanding order.
Place an order
- Choose Add
- Start from a requisition or a quotation, if there is one
- Fill the header
- Add the products
- Save
Approval
Where your company uses approval for orders (Approvals for purchases and vouchers), an approver opens the order and chooses Approve. Until then GRN and Create invoice on the order are switched off. Without an approval system the whole order is available at once.
After saving
| You want to | Do this |
|---|---|
| Receive the goods | GRN on the order makes a goods received note, or start a goods received note and find the order in Order no (Receive goods with a goods received note) |
| Invoice at once | Create invoice on the order, or start an invoice and find the order in Order no (Enter a purchase invoice) |
| Give up the whole order | Order cancel: you type Cancel to confirm; it cannot be undone |
| Give up part of it | A Purchase order cancellation (Cancel part of a purchase order) |
| Start a similar order | Copy to new |
| Change it | Edit, until a goods received note or invoice has taken any of it, it is approved or cancelled, or its year is locked |
| Remove it | Delete, under the same conditions (Change or delete a saved purchase document) |
| Send it | Email, Print purchase order voucher or Generate performa invoice |
GRN and Create invoice on the order make the document for everything still outstanding in one step, and the screen warns that this is not for products with serial numbers and not for partial coverage. For anything else open a new goods received note or invoice and choose the order there.
Common questions
Part of the goods arrived. Can I cancel the rest with Order cancel?
No. As soon as a goods received note or an invoice takes any of the order, Order cancel is switched off, like Edit and Delete. Cancel what is left with a Purchase order cancellation (Cancel part of a purchase order).
The order shows Expired. Can I still receive goods against it?
Yes. The Expiry date marks the order Expired in the list, but a goods received note or an invoice can still be made from it. If you no longer want the goods, cancel the order or what is left of it.
I cancelled an order but the list says Expired.
Once its expiry date has passed, a cancelled order shows Expired in the list. It is still cancelled: no goods received note or invoice is offered it.