Overview
Using the Purchase Orders feature of CostMiner, you can prepare Purchase Orders, print or download them as PDFs, and then track the delivery.
The Purchase Orders are created and managed for each job individually.
If you open a job, you can find the Purchase Orders on the right-hand side in a tab adjacent to the Take-off.
A Purchase Order is created for a particular supplier and can have several items.
The items can be generated based on the items in the estimate or entered manually from scratch.
To add Estimate Items to a PO, drag them onto the list of Purchase Orders (far right) or the currently opened Purchase Order (centre). Once the line item is created in a PO and linked to the Estimate Item, the system will automatically update the quantity of the former whenever the quantity of the latter changes.
Using Global Rates and Products with Purchase Orders
A Global Rate is something that you provide to your customers. The Global Rate fields include a description, rate and measuring unit. Global Rates can also be composite. A composite Global Rate contains one or more other rates.
A Product in CostMiner is a product or service that you purchase from a supplier to complete a job. It has a description, price and ordering unit, as well as some other fields.
Products can also be associated with non-composite Global Rates and with line items in an estimate.
Line items in a PO can be optionally linked to a Product. This link is then used in several ways:
- To pre-populate the item descriptions, prices and other fields,
- To make sure that when multiple Estimate Items are added to a PO, they are grouped together, resulting in a single item in the order,
- To automatically add an Estimate Item to an existing draft of a PO for the respective supplier instead of creating a new PO,
- To show a detailed breakdown of all Products that are used in the estimate across all items, including their total quantities and current ordering statuses.
The following diagram shows different ways of using that information to create items in a PO.
Item A – Based on an Estimate Item using Global Rates and Products.
This is the most comprehensive way of using the system. In that scenario, we link each Global Rate with one or more Products. For example, we can associate the Global Rate “Paint” with one or more Products that can come from different suppliers and have different packaging, e.g. 1l, 2l or 4l.
Creating the “Estimate Item A” from the Global Rate directly or by using a composite Rate will automatically link the item to the same Product as the Global Rate. If there are multiple Products, we can select which one to order to physically implement the item.
When we drag and drop “Estimate Item A” into the Purchase Order area, the following happens:
- If we drop it on an opened PO, the item will be added to the PO. If there is already a line item for that Product, the Estimate Item quantity will be added to that item. Otherwise, a new line item will be created. The system will also check that the supplier for the PO is the same as the supplier of the Product linked to “Estimate Item A”.
- If we drop the Estimate Item somewhere else in the Purchase Orders area, the system will check if there is already a draft PO for the supplier. If there is, the item will be added to that PO. If not, the PO will be created.
The system will make sure that the item quantity is recalculated whenever the quantity of the source Estimate Item changes.
Item B – Based on an Estimate Item using only Products.
If we are not using Global Rates, we can still create Estimate Items directly based on the Products. The rest of the process will be the same as described above.
Item C – Based on an Estimate Item without using any lookups.
We can create PO items based on Estimate Items without linking them to Products. In this case, each time we drop an Estimate Item into an existing PO, a new line item will be added. It will not be possible, though, to create or locate Purchase Orders automatically or group the items if the Product is not provided.
Item D – Without an item using Products.
A line can be created in a PO based on a Product without linking it to an Estimate Item. In this case, the description, SKU, rate and ordering unit will be copied from the Product, but the quantity can have an arbitrary value. This value will be additional to the quantities that come from the estimate.
Items of this type, which are not linked to the estimate but are assigned a Product, will be grouped with other items that are assigned the same Product and come from the estimate, such as items A and B.
Item E – Without an item and without using Products.
You can create a line item in a PO from scratch without linking it to the Estimate or assigning a Product. Such items will always appear on separate lines in the PO and will not be grouped with other items.
Order Lifecycle
There are three possible statuses for a Purchase Order:
- Draft – a new Purchase Order.
- Sent – the Purchase Order has been sent to the supplier.
- Delivered – the ordered materials and services have been delivered.
When a PO is created, it is in the Draft state.
Once you have printed and sent it to the supplier, you need to change the status to Sent. After that, the Purchase Order cannot be changed. The Estimate Items that were used to generate it are also locked for editing.
A delivered order can be marked as Delivered.
If you need to make changes to the order or the source items, you can return it to the Draft state.
You can filter out orders with a particular status or search them by the supplier and item descriptions.