Getting started
How the purchasing cycle works
From purchase order to purchase invoice, return and supplier payment — what each document does to your stock, your item costs and the supplier's balance.
2 min readLast updated
In this article
The Purchasing menu covers what you buy: the suppliers you buy from, the orders you place, the invoices that bring goods into stock, and the goods you send back. The purchase invoice is the document that moves stock and money. The purchase order is a commitment only.
The documents and what they do
Document | Where | Stock | Books and supplier balance |
|---|---|---|---|
Purchase order | Purchasing › Purchasing Order | No effect | No effect |
Purchase invoice | Purchasing › Purchase Invoices › Purchasing Invoice | Goods enter the warehouse and the item's average cost is updated | Stock and input tax are debited and the supplier is credited. A cash invoice is paid at once from your cash box |
Supplier return | Purchasing › Return Items to Supplier | Goods leave the warehouse | The supplier's balance goes down by the returned value including tax |
A typical flow
Make sure the supplier exists. See Add a supplier.
Place a purchase order with the items, quantities and agreed prices. It posts nothing.
When the goods arrive, execute the order. This opens a purchase invoice filled in from the order. Adjust it to what was delivered and save. You can also create a purchase invoice directly without an order.
Record the paper receipt numbers of the warehouses, if you use them. See Correct manual receipt numbers.
Pay the supplier from Accounting › Payments › Pay Supplier, unless the invoice was on a cash term.
If goods are faulty or surplus, return them to the supplier.
Goods you hold for a supplier
Mark a purchase line as consignment when the goods arrive but still belong to the supplier. They are kept apart from your own stock. See Receive goods on consignment.
Correcting mistakes
A purchase invoice can be edited or deleted by users with those permissions. Both are refused once the goods have been sold or moved, or once a return or a payment is recorded against the invoice.
Watching suppliers
Each supplier has a profile, a ledger and a Supplier 360 view with spend, payables aging and account activity. To understand why a balance moved, see How purchasing documents change a supplier's balance.