Purchase Orders

You can create a Purchase Order (PO) to document your offer to buy materials or services from a specified vendor. The PO tracks detailed information such as item, labor category, units, and amounts. You can produce a PO document to submit to your vendor.

The information recorded here is not included in the general ledger. You can use the purchases journal to receive items from a PO. At that point, the information is recorded in the general ledger and in PO Payment History. See Vendor Invoices (Purchases Journal) Help for information.

PO Commitment reports are available to help you track how much funds have been committed, what has been received, and what is remaining.

Purchase orders are used on:

• Purchases journal transactions
• PO Payment History
• PO Commitment reports

Data fields in the header - PO Info tab:

Information specific and unique to the PO.

• PO Number - a system-generated number beginning with 'PO' to identify the transaction
• Paperclip - click on the icon to attach a document to the header. A red checkmark will be displayed when a document is attached to the transaction
• Closed - if selected, the PO is closed and does not appear on the list when receiving items from POs on purchases journal transactions. You can manually close a PO even if there are still open items
  
• PO Date - PO issue date
• Vendor Code - vendor code for purchasing the materials or services
• Bill To - from Bill to field on Purchase Order Defaults form. A code representing the address where the vendor should send their invoice. Bill To addresses are established on Billing Addresses(>Setup, >Company, >Shipping Address)
• Ship To - from Ship to field on Purchase Order Defaults form. A code representing the address where the vendor should send the items. Ship To addresses are established on Shipping Addresses (>Setup, >Company, >Shipping Address)
• Ordered by - from Buyer field on Purchase Order Defaults form. The person placing the order
• Good Through Date - calculated by adding the number of Good Thru Days from Purchase Order Defaults to the PO date
• Prepaid Shipping checkbox - if selected, the shipping costs should be prepaid
• Estimated PO Amount - total amount funded for the PO
• Est. Delivery Date - date field to indicate the estimated date for delivery
• Description - provides additional information that is very helpful for reporting

Data fields in the header - Vendor Info tab:

Provides information about order terms with the vendor that can be displayed on POs.

• Vendor Code - same as vendor code on PO Info tab
• Vendor Account - from Account Number field on Payment Info tab of Vendor record
• Payment Terms - from Payment Terms field on Payment Info tab of Vendor record
• Ship Via - from Ship Via field on Purchase Order tab of Vendor record. Ship via codes are established on the Ship Via form (>Setup, >Purchasing, >Ship Via
• Shipping Terms - from Shipping Terms field on Purchase Order tab of Vendor record. Shipping terms codes are established on the Shipping Terms form (>Setup, >Purchasing, >Shipping Terms)

Data fields in the header - PO Options tab:

Provides order requirements and special instructions that can be displayed on POs submitted to vendors.

• Acknowledgement checkbox
• Allow Substitutions checkbox
• Allow Partial Shipment checkbox
• QA Inspection Required checkbox
• Special Instructions - text field to record any additional instructions or information for the vendor to be displayed on the PO

Data fields in the header - Detail Defaults tab:

A place to establish charge code and other default information for recording PO details to make data entry more efficient. Defaults may be overridden on the individual lines of detail.

• Account - default account
• Task - default task
• LC/FP Item - default labor category or item code
• Warehouse - default warehouse location
• Item Location - default item location
• Requested by - default requestor
• Unit of Measure - default unit of measure
• Tax Rate - default tax rate

Data fields in the details:

• Is Qty - if selected, the item extended amount is calculated by multiplying the number of units times the unit price. If not selected, only a dollar amount is required
• Account - account used to record the expense in a purchases journal transaction
• Task - task used to record the expense in a purchases journal transaction. A valid task is required for direct, B&P, and IR&D accounts
• LC/Item - labor category/item code used to record the expense in a purchases journal transaction
• Vendor Item # - text field to record the item number per the vendor
• Quantity - number of units ordered (required if Is Qty is selected)
• Unit of Meas - code to represent the appropriate unit of measure
• Unit Price - cost per unit
• Extension - if Is Qty is selcted, calculation of quantity multiplied by unit price. If Is Qty is not selected, type in the appropriate dollar amount
• Tax % - from tax rate in PO header
• Tax Amount - tax % multiplied by extension
• S&H Amount - estimated dollar amount for shipping & handling
• Subtotal - calculation of extension + tax amount + S&H amount
• Warehse - from warehouse code in header
• Location - from item location code in header
• Requested by - from requested by code in header
• QA Insp - from QA Inspection Required selection in header
• Line Description - text field to record additional details about the item. This information will be copied to the purchases journal transaction line description upon creation

Data fields in the footer:

• Total Extension - total extended amount for all items
• Taxes - total tax amount for all items
• Shipping & Handling - total S&H amount for all items
• Total PO - sum total of the above 3 totals
• Remaining Balance - Estimated PO Amount from header, less Total PO amount

Tips:

• Purchase Order transactions may be created by clicking the Import button. The file must be in a specific format. Print the PO Import Template report, export it in Excel, type in the data, and save it in CSV format. Data Import Instructions and Data Import Templates can be found on the Resources menu on the Accounting sub-menu.
• POs may be copied by using the Copy button
• PO details are not included in the general ledger until they are recorded in a purchases journal transaction
• See Vendor Invoices (Purchases Journal) Help for information about recording a vendor invoice for PO items