Purchase Invoicing is a new Open BETA feature of the BigChange Job Management System, offering a seamless purchase invoice creation. With just a few clicks, you can create a purchase invoice, matching quantities and costs against the original purchase order. You can also upload a PDF of the supplier invoice, keeping everything organised.
What is Open BETA Open Beta means that these features are still in the testing phase, and we've made them available to you for early use. While we believe they are functional and exciting, they might not be completely polished yet. By using these features, you can help us make them even better! You might encounter some quirks or unexpected behaviour. Your input is incredibly valuable, and we welcome any feedback and suggestions you may have during this phase. |
This article provides a detailed guide on creating and managing purchase invoices in BigChange. Understanding how to effectively use this feature can enhance your financial management, inventory tracking, and purchase order transactions.
What is a Purchase Invoice
A purchase invoice in BigChange is a document provided by a supplier to the buyer, detailing the specifics of a purchase. This invoice serves as a financial record for the goods or services acquired. When a company makes a purchase, it receives this invoice from the supplier, which outlines the quantities and costs involved.
Why use a Purchase Invoices?
As part of our finance efforts, we are excited to introduce seamless purchase invoice creation within BigChange. With just a few clicks, you can create a purchase invoice, matching quantities and costs against the original purchase order. You can also upload a PDF of the supplier invoice, keeping everything organised.
If you use the Xero or Sage Integration, before you can create Purchase Invoices, your systems administrator will need to make sure that the 'sync' settings has been enabled in 'Admin setting' to allow the syncing of Purchase Invoices to your financial package.
How to create a Purchase Invoice:
- Navigate to the CRM > Financial Documents.
- Select the Purchase Order you want to raise a Purchase Invoice against from the financial documents list view.
To be able to create a Purchase Invoice the Purchase Order needs to have been sent to a supplier either by email or Marked as sent to supplier.
Sending Your Purchase Order to a Supplier
Choose the purchase order you wish to send to the supplier. You have two options: if you send it through another method, you can simply 'Mark as sent to supplier.' Alternatively, you can select the file and then choose to email it. This option automatically attaches your purchase order to an email, allowing you to send it directly from the BigChange system.
Creating the Purchase Invoice:
Once the Purchase Order has been sent to supplier you will now see a new icon Invoice.
By selecting the Invoice icon, the system will quickly add all the line items from the Purchase Order to the Purchase Invoice.
Purchase Invoice details
Invoice Number
In order to be able to process this Purchase Invoice you will need to add an Invoice number, in most cases will be the PI number provided by your supplier when they generated the invoice.
Issue date
This will be given today’s date by default but you can select a different date by using the date picker.
Due date
This will be given today’s date by default but you can select a different date by using the date picker.
Line descriptions
Upon receiving your PI from the supplier you can amend any of the line item details such as nominal or VAT codes should you require. This can easily be done by using the drop-down lists for Nominal and VAT codes and selecting the Description field.
Adding New Line Items
There are two option to add line items to your invoice:
- One-time items
- Predefined invoicing items.
To add a new line item, select the + Add item (icon) and then start typing, the system will search for any predefined invoicing items you have previously created and saved in the system.
Add a one-time item
Should you require a custom line item (‘one-time item)’, type a description, and then select ‘Add one-time item’.
You will notice that the system will ask you to allocated a nominal code, price and VAT rate (these will be highlighted by a red box as they are mandatory).
When a user attempts to either save or approve a Purchase Invoice within the system, it is essential that all mandatory fields are properly filled out to ensure the integrity and completeness of the data. If the user tries to proceed without completing these required fields, the system will intervene to prevent any incomplete or incorrect entries from being processed. The system will then display an error message to inform the user of the issue. This error message will appear in a red Error Message box, making it highly visible and easily noticeable.
Predefined item
To add a predefined item:
- Select the + Add item icon and start typing; the system will bring up any predefined invoicing items currently stored in the system as a list.
- Select the one you require.
Once you have selected your predefined item from the list it will pull details including nominal code, price and VAT rate as long as those details are already saved in the system against the predefined invoicing item.
Should you wish to add any predefined involving items to the system, this can only be done by a system administrator by navigating to Account Settings > Settings > FINANCIAL > Predefined invoicing items.
Removing Line Items
To remove a line item:
- Select the three dots icon to the right of the item line.
- Select Remove.
Once you have created your Purchase Invoice you have 2 options:
- Save & close
- Approve for payment
Save & close Purchase Invoice
Save & close will save the purchase invoice so that you can come back and edit again before approving for payment.
Approving Purchase Invoices for Payment
Once you have created your Purchase Invoice, you can either save and close it for later editing or approve it for payment, which will then synchronise it through to Xero or Sage if you have the financial integration configured.
Retrieving a Purchase Invoice
New Purchase Invoicing List View
To view the Purchasing invoicing list view you need to have had your site upgraded to running 'New Navigation'. Please refer to the New navigation bar article if you are unsure.
Within the 'New navigation bar' (top menu) you will see a new menu item called:
- 'Job Finance' and under Job finance you will see:
- 'Purchasing' which is the list view for purchase invoicing.
You are also able to retrieve a Purchase Invoice by:
- Navigating to CRM > Financial Documents.
- Locate the Purchase Order you have raised the Purchase Invoice against and select "Edit". Please note, should you select the Invoice icon this will create a new purchase invoice.
- Select the Purchase Invoices tab. Here you will find a list of the purchase invoices created against this purchase order.
- By selecting any purchase invoice in the Received status you can go back in to edit it.
On this list view you will see the following information:
Invoice Number – | Purchase Invoice number |
Date – | Purchase invoice creation date |
Due date – | Due date of Purchase invoice |
Status – | Where the Purchase invoice has been saved (received) or Approved for payment |
Due – | The balance of the Purchase invoice due. |
This allows you to toggle the columns visibility on and off in this list.
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By selecting the 3 dots (icon) you are able to Approve for payment from the list view of any purchase invoice in a ‘received’ status
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Purchase Invoice Extras
Purchase Order details and status
You can find details of the Purchase Order, your Purchase invoice is being raised against in the Purchase Order window on the right.
Purchase Invoice Activity (Audit Trail)
The Activity window in a Received status purchase invoice serves as an audit trail.
If you go back into a purchase invoice in a Received status you will now see on the right an ‘Activity’ window, which serves as an audit trial.
Querying a Purchase Invoice.
From the list view, you can change a Received purchase invoice to a query state by selecting the three dots and selecting Query.
You will see that the status now displays as Queried.
After resolving the query, select the three dots again and then Approve for payment. This action will change the status to Approved for payment.
When the activities widget transitions to a Queried status, this change will be recorded for auditing purposes.
You can allow certain users the permission to Place a purchase invoice in query. Please refer to the Admin Settings for permission section of this article.
Create a query alert
Navigate to Alerts in the top menu:
-
Create new alert.
- Who = Any web user
- What = Has a purchase order status changed to (3) 'Queried'.
- Populate the rest of the relevant fields. For more information on alerts please refer to the article on Creating Alerts.
Admin Setting for Permissions
There are four permissions associated with purchase invoicing:
- Create purchase invoice
- Approve Purchase invoice for payment
- View purchase invoices
- Place a purchase invoice in query
These can only be amended/setup by a system administrator by navigating to Account Settings > Settings > Web Users > Roles
Xero/Sage Intergration
- If you use Xero Integration, before you can create your Purchase Invoices, your system administrator will need to make sure that the 'sync' setting has been enabled in 'Admin setting' to allow the syncing of Purchase Invoices to Xero.
- If you use Sage integration, before you can create Purchase Invoices, system administrator will need to upgrade the Sage tool to the latest version on order to be able to sync Purchase Invoices to Sage.
Conclusion
Understanding how to create and manage Purchase Invoices in BigChange is crucial for efficient financial management and inventory tracking. By following the steps outlined in this guide, you can streamline your purchase order transactions and enhance your operations.
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