Purchase Orders

Create, track, and receive purchase orders to manage your inventory replenishment and maintain accurate stock levels.

What are purchase orders?

A purchase order (PO) is a document you create when ordering products from a supplier. It tracks what you ordered, from whom, expected quantities, costs, and delivery status. When products arrive, you receive them against the PO to update your inventory.

Purchase orders help you:

Track orders

Know what's been ordered and what's pending delivery

Control costs

Track spending and maintain order history with suppliers

Accurate receiving

Match deliveries against orders to catch discrepancies

Update inventory

Automatically add received items to your stock

Purchase order lifecycle

Purchase orders move through several statuses as they progress from creation to completion:

Draft

Order created but not yet sent to supplier

Sent

Order sent to supplier, awaiting delivery

Received

All items received and added to inventory

Cancelled

Order cancelled, will not be fulfilled

Partial receiving

You can receive orders partially if only some items arrive. The PO stays in "Sent" status until all items are received or you manually mark it complete.

Creating a purchase order

Steps to create a purchase order

Go to Inventory → Purchase Orders

Click 'New Purchase Order'

Select a supplier from your supplier list

Add line items: select products and enter quantities

Optionally add costs per item

Add any notes (delivery instructions, etc.)

Save as Draft or Send to supplier

PO fields explained

Supplier

Required

The vendor you're ordering from. Must be set up in Suppliers first.

Line Items

Required

Products and quantities you're ordering. At least one item required.

Unit Cost

Price per unit for each item. Used to calculate order total.

Expected Date

When you expect delivery. Helps track overdue orders.

Notes

Delivery instructions, special requests, or internal notes.

Destination Location

Which location will receive the inventory.

Sending to supplier

Once your purchase order is ready, you can send it to your supplier. This changes the status from Draft to Sent.

Send options:

Email: Send the PO directly to the supplier's email address
Download PDF: Generate a PDF to print or send manually
Mark as Sent: Update status if you communicated the order another way

Receiving orders

When products arrive from your supplier, you "receive" them against the purchase order. This updates your inventory with the received quantities.

Steps to receive a purchase order

Open the purchase order you want to receive

Click 'Receive Order' button

Enter the quantity received for each item

Note any discrepancies (damaged, missing items)

Confirm to update inventory

Verify before receiving

Always physically count items before marking them as received. Receiving updates your inventory immediately, so incorrect quantities will affect your stock accuracy.

Handling discrepancies

Short shipment

Received less than ordered. Receive what you got; remaining stays on order.

Over shipment

Received more than ordered. Decide whether to keep or return excess.

Damaged items

Don't receive damaged items. Note the issue and contact supplier.

Best practices

Create PO before ordering

Always create the PO in the system before placing the order with your supplier.

Include all details

Add item costs and expected dates to get full value from reporting and tracking.

Receive promptly

Receive orders as soon as products arrive to keep inventory accurate.

Document discrepancies

Note any issues in the PO for future reference and supplier discussions.