Purchase invoices

Purchase invoices are a feature located within the Finance module of the Flowlens application.

Creating a purchase invoice from a GRN

Goods can be received against a purchase order once the order has been 'Sent to the Supplier', an action found in a purchase order's 'Actions' drop-down.

In the Flowlens application, these goods received notes are referred to as 'GRN'. A valid GRN should be approved once it has been raised.

A goods received note, in the GRN tab of a Purchase Order

Once you receive a purchase invoice from the supplier, the GRN should be approved and the Supplier Invoice details entered. Once a GRN is approved, the option to generate a purchase order appears against it.

Once a GRN is raised, the GRN can then be approved.
Once users receive a purchase invoice from the supplier, the GRN should be approved and the Supplier Invoice details should be entered.
Once a GRN is approved, it cannot be cancelled.
Once a GRN is approved, the option to generate a POI appears against it.

Generate Invoice from a GRN (highlighted)

Generating an invoice from a GRN does the following:

Relates the purchase invoice to the purchase order
Copies all the line items to the purchase invoice from the approved GRN
Once a GRN is approved, it cannot be cancelled.

Users can generate one or many purchase invoices against a purchase order, although a purchase invoice may only ever be linked to one purchase order.

Nominal and VAT rules when generating a POI from a GRN

Part Name and Description will come from the purchase order line item Name and Description. These will be joined and populated in the ‘Description’ field in purchase invoice line items.
The purchase VAT will come from the Supplier’s purchase VAT. If the company has no purchase VAT, the VAT field will not auto-populate.
The nominal account will come from 'Purchase Nominal field’ of the part used in the purchase order line item. If the part did not have this value, then the field will not be auto-populated.

Creating a purchase invoice from the purchase invoice index page

Users can create a purchase invoice directly by selecting 'New Purchase Invoice' from the purchase invoice index page. This link is found within the 'Finances' menu.

Purchase invoice link (highlighted)

! Users must ensure that all relevant line items, tax rates, values and other information entered is correct before saving.

Purchase invoices for users with integrated accountancy packages

Users with integrated accounting packages will have an option to send a purchase invoice directly to their accounting package. The 'send to accountancy package' link displays in a purchase invoice's 'Actions' drop-down.

'Send to Accountancy Package' link (highlighted)

Users can also refresh the purchase invoice to their accountancy package until such times as the purchase invoice is cancelled.

! If the customer being invoiced already exists in the accounting package and Flowlens has the customer’s unique accounting package ID, then the customer ID will be seen on the invoice. Also, the invoice will be sent to the accounts and the unique Invoice ID will be returned to the invoice page on Flowlens.

Authorising and sending the purchase invoice are not required for accountancy package integration, but should still be used through the working business process to ensure that all purchase invoices are accurate. Purchase invoices should be set to status of 'Authorised' once this has been confirmed by the user.

! If the customer name does not exist in the accounting package, i.e. this is the first time a user deals with the customer via Flowlens, then the user will be prompted to either create a customer in the accounting package, or relate it to an existing customer there.

Purchase invoices for users without integrated accounting packages

There is an ‘Invoice’ tab on every purchase order, which displays all the invoices associated with the purchase order.

Users without integrated accountancy packages can set the status of purchase invoices to the following:

Authorise invoice - To be set once the purchase invoice is confirmed.
Mark as 'Sent' - The purchase invoice has been emailed to someone, i.e the customer
Mark as 'Paid' - The purchase invoice value has been paid out to the customer.

These statuses can be set through the relevant purchase invoice's 'Actions' drop-down.

! Users will only be able to mark a purchase invoice as 'Paid' after it has been authorised.