The Purchases Overview (titled AP Purchases Hub, with the line "Oversee supplier bills, payments, and expenses") is the one-page summary of your payables side. It shows what you owe suppliers today, how much of it is overdue, what you paid and spent today, the status mix of your bills, and shortcuts to create and review purchase documents. It reads your posted records only and never changes anything.
Use it as the morning check before paying suppliers. For the detailed lists use Bills, Expenses and Payments; for aging and statements use Payables reports.
Where to find it
- Dashboard panel → Overview group → Purchases Overview.
- Purchases → AP (Purchases) panel → Overview group → Purchases Overview (under the Suppliers group).
- URL
/ap/purchases.
You need the purchases.bills.view permission and at least one of the bills, expenses, supplier payments or suppliers features in your plan. Members who cannot open reports are sent to the bills list instead, because the overview is built on the same payables figures the reports use.
What is on the page
Header buttons
| Button | Opens |
|---|---|
| New Bill | A new bill form |
| Supplier Payments | A new supplier payment form |
| Expenses | A new expense form |
| Purchase Orders | The purchase orders list (shown when purchase orders are enabled and in your plan) |
| Landed Cost | A new landed cost (shown when landed costs are in your plan; with SolaStock connected the landed cost is created in SolaStock, see Landed costs) |
Four tiles
| Tile | What the number is | The line under it |
|---|---|---|
| Bills Payable | Money still owed on posted supplier bills, in your base currency, as of today. It is the balance due of each bill: the bill total minus posted payments and applied debit notes. Draft and void bills are not counted. Expenses are not included. | Open and the number of bills |
| Overdue | The part of Bills Payable whose due date is before today. | The number of overdue bills |
| Bill payments today | Posted supplier payments dated today that are allocated to bills. | Today and the number of payments |
| Expenses today (shown as Posted expenses today) | Posted, partly paid and paid expenses dated today, at their full total. | Today and the number of expenses |
Foreign-currency bills are converted at the document rate, or at the revalued rate when a revaluation applies, exactly as in the AP Aging report, so the Bills Payable tile matches the total of AP Aging Summary for today when you look at bills only. Posted expenses that are still unpaid appear in the aging reports but not in this tile.
Bill status breakdown
Five bars: Draft, Unpaid, Partially paid, Overdue and Paid, each with the number of bills and its share of those five groups. View All opens the bills list.
Quick Actions
Short links: Create and review supplier bills, Pay bills and view disbursements, Record and manage expenses, and Manage landed costs when landed costs are available.
Latest records
Three cards of the five most recent entries: Latest bills, Latest supplier payments and Latest expenses. Each row shows the number, date, supplier, amount and status, and View All opens the full list. The last row of cards is a set of shortcuts to Bills, Expenses, Supplier Payments, Debit Notes, Supplier Refunds and, when enabled, Purchase Orders and Landed Costs.
How each number is worked out
| Item | Rule |
|---|---|
| Bills Payable | Take every posted bill (not draft, not void) dated on or before today. For each, subtract the posted supplier payments allocated to it and the debit notes applied to it, both counted up to today. Keep bills whose balance is above AED 0.01. Convert each balance to base currency at the bill's rate (or its revalued carrying amount) and add them up. |
| Overdue | The same bills, restricted to those whose due date is before today. A bill due today is not overdue yet. |
| Count under a tile | The number of bills (or payments, or expenses) behind the amount, not the number of suppliers. |
| Bill payments today | Supplier payments in status Posted, dated today, that are allocated to at least one bill. A payment with no bill allocation (a general supplier payment or an advance) is not counted here. |
| Expenses today | Expenses in status Posted, Partially Paid or Paid, dated today, at their full total whether or not they are paid. |
| Bill status breakdown | The number of bills in each status, regardless of date: draft, unpaid, partially paid, overdue and paid. Each bar is that status as a percentage of the five groups together. Void bills are not shown. |
| Latest records | The five most recent bills, supplier payments and expenses, newest date first, with whatever status they have; the status line under each amount tells you whether it is a draft. |
All amounts on the tiles are in your base currency. The amounts in the Latest cards are shown in each document's own currency.
How it connects
- Posting a bill raises Bills Payable; posting a supplier payment or applying a debit note lowers it.
- A bill becomes Overdue here on the day after its due date, the same rule as the AP Aging reports and the overdue counter next to Bills in the sidebar.
- Voiding or unposting a document removes it from the tiles immediately.
- Bills Payable is the bills-only part of the AP Aging Summary total. The aging report adds unpaid posted expenses and shows a reconciliation to the Accounts Payable account (Payables reports).
- The Expenses today tile counts the expense document total, not cash paid. A cash purchase and an unpaid expense posted on the same day both appear in it; only the unpaid one appears in aging.
- On an organization connected to SolaStock, bills that are posted but not yet received still count in Bills Payable (you owe the supplier from posting); receiving is tracked on the bill, see Receiving goods on supplier bills.
Permissions and plan
| Need | Permission or feature |
|---|---|
| Open the overview | purchases.bills.view, plus at least one of the bills, direct expenses, payments made or suppliers features in your plan |
| See the figures | View reports (reports.view). Without it you are redirected to the bills list. |
| Purchase Orders button and card | Purchase orders enabled for the organization and included in your plan |
| Landed Cost button and card | Landed costs in your plan |
| The shortcuts | Each opens a page with its own permission; a link you cannot use shows that page's "no access" message |
The overview is read-only, so there is nothing to approve and no document is changed by opening it. The default Purchasing role has bills view but not report access, so purchasing clerks land on the bills list.
A suggested weekly routine
- Open Purchases Overview at the start of the week and note the Overdue tile.
- Click View All on Bill status breakdown and filter the bills list by Overdue, or use Due in 7 days in the Any due date filter to see what is coming.
- Pay what is due with Supplier Payments; check Bill payments today afterwards.
- Post any Draft bills (the draft bar shows how many are waiting) so that they enter Bills Payable and aging.
- Run AP Aging Summary for the end of the week and file it with the reconciliation block.
Worked examples
1. Reading the tiles. Al Noor Trading LLC has these posted bills on 12 October 2026 (AED, VAT 5% included in the totals):
| Bill | Total | Paid / credits | Due date |
|---|---|---|---|
| BL-2041 Gulf Paper Supplies LLC | 4,200.00 | 0.00 | 30 Oct 2026 |
| BL-2038 Emirates Lighting LLC | 7,560.00 | 3,000.00 payment | 05 Oct 2026 |
| BL-2030 Dubai Cleaning Services | 1,575.00 | 1,575.00 payment | 20 Sep 2026 |
Bills Payable = 4,200.00 + (7,560.00 - 3,000.00) = AED 8,760.00 over 2 bills (BL-2030 is paid). Overdue = AED 4,560.00 over 1 bill (BL-2038, seven days past due). Bill payments today shows AED 0.00 until you post a payment dated today.
2. What changes when you act. You post a supplier payment dated today of AED 4,560.00 from Emirates NBD against BL-2038 (journal: Dr Accounts Payable 4,560.00 / Cr Bank 4,560.00). The overview now shows Bills Payable AED 4,200.00 over 1 bill, Overdue AED 0.00, and Bill payments today AED 4,560.00 (1 payment). The status bars move BL-2038 from Overdue to Paid.
3. A foreign-currency bill. Al Noor also has bill BL-2055 from a US supplier for USD 1,000.00, booked at 1 USD = AED 3.6725, due on 09 October. On 12 October no payment has been made. Bills Payable includes it at its base-currency balance (AED 3,672.50 at the booked rate, or its revalued amount if you have run a base currency adjustment) and Overdue includes it too, because it is three days past due. The bill's own page and the bills list still show USD 1,000.00.
Tips and common problems
- The tile differs from the AP Aging report. The aging report also lists unpaid posted expenses and can be run for another date. Compare with the report dated today and the Bills only view.
- A payment is not counted today. Only posted supplier payments dated today appear; drafts and payments dated on another day do not.
- I land on the bills list instead. Your role cannot open reports.