How to create a supplier
In order to start creating purchase orders, you need to have at least one supplier created first.
Go to Suppliers and click on a blue button that says Create Supplier.
Fill in the details in the supplier creation table that will pop up. The email address you will enter here will be used to email the purchase order to your supplier.
3. Click on Save and that’s it! Your first supplier has been created.
How to add suppliers to inventory items
When you have created your suppliers, the next step is to add them to your products.
Go to Inventory and open a product for which you want a supplier to be added.
Inside a product page find the Supplier Name section and select the correct supplier from the dropdown list. If the list is empty, create a supplier first.
If you have a lot of products and need suppliers added on all of them in bulk, follow the guide on How to Update Inventory Items via csv
How to create a purchase order manually
After creating suppliers and adding them to inventory items we are all set to start creating purchase orders.
Let’s go to the inventory first to see which items are running out of stock and need PO creating:
Let’s start creating a purchase order for the product Pants S Green. The red low stock alert indicates the total quantity we have for this product is 4 which is below the reorder point that is 16.
Let’s order some more of this item.
Go to Purchases and click on the blue button on the top right Create PO
The pop up will appear where you will need to fill in the details:
In the Supplier Name choose the supplier from the dropdown. I have opened Pants S Green product to check the supplier and I can see that it’s Anne:
The field Term is filled automatically and indicates the payment term you defined when creating a supplier.
Ref means a reference number that you can choose to input as a PO identification number
Created automatically displays today's date but you can change it if needed
In the Expected field you can define the date you expect your items to arrive
Shipping Address is the address where the items should be delivered. If you have Multiple Warehouses enabled, you can choose the warehouse the items should be delivered to
In section Item details you have to add items you want to order. You can search for them by Supplier SKU, Product Name, or SKU.
Enter the Qty to define how many items you want to order
Rate will define your Buy Price which you pay for a supplier for a single item. If it is already defined in your inventory, it will appear here automatically
Amount will be automatically calculated by multiplying a quantity by rate
In the last step, you can leave a note to the supplier like “Deliver after lunch”
3. Click on Raise Order
Your order has now been raised and you can find it in your Purchases list:
How to email a Purchase Order to a Supplier
When the PO has been raised, this doesn’t mean it has been already sent to the supplier - it has been raised within Multiorders only.
To email PO for your supplier:
Open the PO by clicking on the PO number
To preview the PO you can click on Actions and Print:
3. Purchase order will open up so you can double-check the details and review everything again. If all details are correct, click on Email - Purchase Order
That’s it! Your purchase order has been successfully emailed to the supplier.
How do items ordered via PO reflect in inventory
If you go to Inventory and find the product for which you just raised a PO, you will see that Awaiting column has updated with the number of items you ordered when raising PO (45 in this case):
How to mark purchase order as paid
Once you raise a PO it automatically shows as unpaid.
Let’s say your accounting pays for the ordered items to your supplier and you now need to mark it as paid.
Open PO by clicking on PO number
Click on a green button that says Mark As Paid:
That’s it! Your order is now showing as paid:
How does the stock quantity change after receiving items ordered via PO
Now let’s head to inventory to see how it has changed after receiving PO.
Awaiting column has turned 0 since there are no more products we are awaiting to be delivered.
The product total quantity automatically changed from 4 to 49 after receiving 45 items.
Once the total quantity changes, this change is automatically sent to your marketplaces as well (WooCommerce in this case).
How to create purchase orders automatically
To expedite your Purchase Order creation process, you can use the Auto PO feature which allows you to create Purchase Orders in bulk.
There are two ways to create Purchase Orders automatically:
By Reorder Point
By All Ordered
Creating Purchase Orders by Reorder Point
By choosing this option, Multiorders will automatically create Purchase Orders for all inventory items which are running low on stock and are below the Reorder Point.
If you haven’t set up Reorder Point yet, follow this guide to do it first: How to Set Inventory Reorder Point.
NOTE: make sure you have suppliers added to your inventory items, otherwise Auto POs will not be generated.
Go to the Purchases tab, click on the Auto PO button and Reorder Point:
Purchase Orders are now automatically created for the items that are below the Reorder Point. You can find them in drafts:
3. From the drafts section, open the PO you want to raise and review the details first. The quantity of the items ordered will be automatically input according to the formula: Reorder Point - Available Items.
For example, if we are raising an order for the item Pants L Blue, the quantity that will be input in PO will be 25 - 14 = 11
4. After reviewing the PO details, click on Raise Order:
That’s it! Your order has been raised. You can now email it to your supplier by clicking on Email inside the purchase order.
Creating Purchase Orders by All Ordered
By choosing this option, Multiorders will automatically create Purchase Orders based on the items sold during a selected time period.
Go to the Purchases tab, click on Auto PO - All Ordered and select a time interval of the received orders according to which purchase orders will be created:
Let’s say you selected Last Month. Multiorders will now create purchase orders for those items that were ordered last month and the quantity will be automatically selected based on how many items were sold during this period. You can find your POs generated in the Drafts section:
After reviewing the PO details, click on Raise Order:
That’s it! Your order has been raised. You can now email it to your supplier by clicking on Email inside the purchase order.