Purchase orders

A purchase order (PO) is the order you send a supplier before goods or services arrive. It records what you ordered, at what price, and tracks how much has been received and billed. A PO has no accounting effect: nothing posts to the ledger until you turn it into a bill.

Where to find it

• Sidebar: Purchases → AP (Purchases) → Documents → Purchase Orders (URL /ap/purchase-orders).
• Quick create: + quick-add menu → Purchases → New Purchase Order.
• The menu item only appears when purchase orders are enabled for your organization and included in your plan.

The purchase orders list

All columns except Created are on by default; a saved view can hide any of them.

Filters: search box, a supplier picker, status picker (Draft, Approved, Sent, Partially Received, Received, Closed, Cancelled), All receiving (Not received, Partly received, Received), and a from/to date range on the PO date. Click Filter to apply. You can also save views and export to Excel; the export has the same columns, order and language as the list.

Create a purchase order

1. Click New Purchase Order (top right of the list).
2. Fill in the header:

3. Add lines in Line Items: item or account, description, Qty (must be greater than zero — "Each line quantity must be greater than zero."), Unit, Price, Disc., Tax. At least one line is required.
4. Optionally apply a document discount at the bottom.
5. Click Save Draft (purchase orders are always created as drafts).

You land on the PO page with "Purchase order created successfully."

Approve a purchase order

Without an approval workflow: on a draft PO, click Approve and confirm "Approve this PO?". The PO becomes Approved and is locked against editing.

With an approval workflow for purchase orders (see Workflow approvals): the PO waits for approval and only an eligible approver other than the requester can approve it ("You cannot approve your own document."). While approval is pending, sending, receiving, closing and cancelling are blocked with "This document must have a current approval before …".

Send it to the supplier

• Send — marks an approved PO as sent ("Send this PO?").
• Email it from the PO page's email panel. Queuing the email also marks an approved PO as Sent. Email history is kept on the page.
• PDF downloads the printable PO.

Receive quantities

Once the PO is Sent (or partially received), click Receive at the top of the PO.

1. The Receive purchase order page lists each line with Ordered, Received so far and Remaining.
2. Enter the quantity received now in Receive now for each line that arrived. Leave others at 0.
3. Click Save.

Validation:

• Whole numbers only, between 0 and the remaining quantity: "Enter whole quantities within the amount remaining."
• At least one line must have a quantity: "Enter a received quantity for at least one item."
• More than the outstanding quantity is refused: "Received quantity exceeds the outstanding purchase order quantity."

After saving you see "Received quantities saved on the purchase order." The PO becomes Received when every line is fully received, otherwise partially received. Each receipt is kept in the PO's audit history.

Receiving on the PO only records quantities. It does not change stock or the ledger: "Record received quantities here. Inventory stock updates through the applicable bill or Stock goods receipt workflow." If you use SolaStock, receive goods there — see SolaStock purchasing.

Items owned by SolaStock. In a SolaStock-connected organization a PO that includes stock items owned by SolaStock cannot be marked received in SolaCount: "'…' is managed by SolaStock, so received quantities cannot be marked on this purchase order. Convert the order to a supplier bill, then receive the goods from the bill or in SolaStock." The PO page shows the hint "This order includes items managed by SolaStock. To receive them, convert the order to a supplier bill, then receive the goods from the bill or in SolaStock." See Receiving goods on supplier bills.

Convert to a bill

Click Create bill from order at the top of the PO and confirm "Create a supplier bill for the remaining ordered quantity?".

• Available when the PO is Sent, partially received, Received or partially billed, and you have the purchase_orders.convert_to_bill permission.
• The new bill is a draft, dated today, for the same supplier, currency and project, with the PO number as its reference.
• It contains every line that still has ordered quantity not yet billed, at the PO's prices, taxes and accounts. It bills the remaining ordered quantity, not just what was received, so adjust quantities on the draft bill if the supplier billed less.
• The PO becomes Closed when every line is fully billed, otherwise partially billed.
• If nothing is left to bill, you are taken to the last bill created from this PO, or see "This purchase order has no quantity available to bill."
• A line with no item and no account of its own is billed to your organization's default purchases account (Settings → Account Defaults). If that default is missing, inactive or not postable, nothing is created: "Configure a valid default purchases account in Account Defaults, or use an item/account on the order, then retry conversion. No bill was created." Account lines shown on the new draft read Assigned when billed until the bill is created.
• With SolaStock connected, stock items on the PO become stock lines on the draft bill. Receive them from the bill, as described in Receiving goods on supplier bills.

Then open the bill, enter the supplier's bill number, check the lines and Post to GL. See Bills.

Close or cancel

• Close — for a PO that is partially received, received or partially billed, when you do not expect the rest ("Close this PO?").
• Cancel — for a Draft, awaiting-approval, Approved or Sent PO that will not go ahead ("Cancel this PO?").
• Delete — drafts only.

Status lifecycle

Buttons only appear when both your role and the PO's status allow the action. The default Purchasing role can create, edit, delete drafts, send and convert purchase orders to bills, but cannot approve, receive, close or cancel them.

Worked example

Al Noor Trading LLC orders 100 LED panels at AED 120 each (5% VAT) from Emirates Lighting LLC.

1. PO-00012 is saved as a draft: subtotal AED 12,000, VAT AED 600, total AED 12,600. No ledger entry.
2. The manager approves it and it is emailed: status Sent.
3. 60 panels arrive. Receive 60: status partially received (60 of 100).
4. The supplier bills for the 60 panels. Click Create bill from order; the draft bill shows 100 panels (the remaining ordered quantity). Change the quantity to 60, enter the supplier's bill number and post: Dr Inventory 7,200, Dr Input VAT 360, Cr Accounts Payable 7,560.
5. The PO is now partially billed for the 40 panels not yet billed. If the remaining 40 will not come, click Close.

Supplier advances

The PO page has a Make Payment link for its supplier. Use it to pay a deposit before the bill exists: record the payment as an advance, and apply it to the bill once posted. See Payments. Deposits do not affect AP aging until applied to a bill.

Permissions

Tips

• Receive on the PO first and bill second if you want the PO to show what arrived; the bill is what posts to the ledger.
• Use Landed costs to spread freight and duty over the stock items on a PO.

Related

• Bills
• Landed costs
• Suppliers
• Payments
• Workflow approvals