Create purchase orders from a sales order

When a sales order needs stock you do not have on hand, Qoblex can turn the ordered products into draft purchase orders so you can buy the stock in. Instead of copying product lines into a new purchase order by hand, you select the sales order (or orders), and Qoblex opens a generator that groups the products by supplier and pre-fills the quantities from customer demand.

This article covers the two places you can start this from in the sales workspace, the Generate Purchase Orders dialog, and what Qoblex creates. For sending an order straight to a supplier who ships directly to your customer, see the dropshipping variant linked below instead.

When to use this

Use this workflow when a sales order contains products you must purchase before you can fulfill it, for example items that are out of stock, non-stocked buy-to-order products, or an order that exceeds your available quantity. The generator carries the customer’s ordered quantity through to the purchase order and links the two together, so purchasing stays tied back to the demand that created it.

If the supplier will ship the goods directly to your customer rather than into your own warehouse, use Drop Ship instead of this action. Drop Ship is a separate action on the sales list and is covered in the Dropshipping section.

Where to start

There are two entry points in the sales workspace.

From the Sales Orders list (one or more orders)

1. Go to the Sales Orders list.
2. Tick the checkbox on each sales order you want to buy stock for. You can select several orders at once.
3. Open the Actions menu and choose Create Purchase Order.
4. The Generate Purchase Orders dialog opens with the products from every selected order.

You can select up to 30 orders for this action. If you select more, Qoblex shows Too many orders selected with the message Please select 30 orders or less to create purchase orders and does not open the generator. Split the work into smaller batches to stay within the limit.

From an open sales order

1. Open the sales order.
2. Open the More actions menu and, under Workflow, choose Create Purchase Order.
3. The Generate Purchase Orders dialog opens with the products from that order.

The Generate Purchase Orders dialog

The dialog shows one block per supplier. Qoblex groups the product lines by the supplier set on each product, so each block becomes a separate draft purchase order.

Each supplier block has:

• Supplier – the supplier the purchase order will be raised against. It is pre-selected from the product’s supplier. You can change it from the dropdown; switching the supplier updates the order’s currency and price list to match that supplier.
• Location – where the stock will be received. This starts as Select a location, and you must choose one before the order can be created.
• A product table with these columns:

Adjust the Quantity to order on any line before creating the orders, for example to round up to a supplier’s minimum order quantity or to combine with other demand.

To review the batch:

1. Check the Supplier on each block and change it where the product should come from a different supplier.
2. Choose a Location for each purchase order.
3. Adjust the Quantity to order on any line.
4. If a whole block is not needed, use Delete Order at the top of that block to drop it from the batch.

When the batch is ready, choose Create (N) purchase orders in the footer, where N is the number of supplier blocks. Choose Cancel to close without creating anything.

Every purchase order in the batch must have a Location selected. If any block is missing one, Qoblex shows Missing Shipping Location and will not create the orders. You also need at least one supplier defined in your account, otherwise Qoblex shows No suppliers defined and stops.

Only product lines are carried into the generator. Lines that are not tied to a product variant are skipped, so a purchase order is created only for the products that need buying in.

What gets created

When you confirm, Qoblex creates the purchase orders and confirms Your purchase orders have been created. For each supplier block:

• A new purchase order is created in Draft status for that supplier, using the supplier’s currency and price list where those are set, and a due date 30 days out.
• Each line carries the product variant, the Quantity to order, and the purchase price from the product.
• The purchase order is linked back to the source sales order as a back-order relationship, so you can trace the purchase to the demand that created it. When several selected sales orders feed the same supplier, the resulting purchase order is linked back to all of them.

After the batch is created you can open each purchase order from the block header (the order number becomes a link) to review and continue it. The purchase orders arrive as drafts, so they are not yet approved or sent to the supplier.

Next steps

• Manage, approve, and receive the created purchase orders in the Purchasing section. See Create a purchase order and Purchase order statuses and actions.
• To have the supplier ship directly to your customer instead, use the Drop Ship action and follow Create dropship purchase orders from a sales order in the Dropshipping section.