@lubos Delivery status on Sales Orders and Purchase Orders tab shows Delivered whenever Qty reserved/Qty on order is zero. So when an order is invoiced and not delivered yet, it shows delivered status for that order.
It should get the status from the actual tracking of each item like in the SS above rather than from the qty reserved figure.
Also there is terminology issue on Purchase order tab. Not that much of an issue still it could be improved
The mechanics are correct. Sales order is “closed” whether qty ordered is either invoiced or delivered. One of those two. Obviously calling it Delivery Status is wrong. It should be called something else.
This is how it worked previously but I realized it was wrong. The purpose of orders is to track quantities reserved so we can calculate Qty available for inventory item.
From accounting point of view, it’s not required for sales orders to be linked to Delivery Notes. Linking orders to sales invoices is enough.
Sales orders do not really create obligation to actually deliver inventory item from accounting point of view. Sales invoices do create this obligation because item is sold but you still have it physically on hand (until shipped). Or delivery note create obligation to invoice customer because you have physically removed the item from inventory but you still own it (until invoice is issued).
My point is, Sales Orders are really just to track what your customers want but you can abandon the order at any point and in any state without consequences.
I think to solve this, we really just need singular Status column. And the order is “completed” when it’s either Invoiced or Delivered. One of those two.
Many of my clients over the years, after having established credit and a credit limit with a customer, adopted the following workflow. Acceptance of a customer purchase order would be entered as a sales order and, as long as the shipment was within the credit limit of the customer, would ship available inventory immediately after. The invoice to the customer would then be generated by the software once shipment had been confirmed. This improved customer service levels by getting product to them asap and would also flag credit issues.
@lubos i assume you are thinking of making the Status based on Qty reserved so the moment it becomes zero the order is completed. This may not be great way to do it as it would make Sales Order tab meaningless for some users. As they would have to track orders which are not invoiced but delivered and vice versa from inventory through Qty to deliver column. Right now Sales Orders tab shows what is being done and what needs to be done.
And this column clearly states “delivery status” so if someone want to track it they need activate it and link delivery notes to orders too.
Even if you add this column don’t remove the current ones as it makes it easy for us to track Indvidual order delivery and invoice status, like @VACUUMDOG mentioned
Or if Custom Columns feature is introduced which i suggested earlier then at some point that would even eliminate the need of these built-in status columns. Then, everyone can have these columns whether status or anything else according to their requirements.
I know what you mean although from Manager point of view, sales order has been “handled”.
Now you will see on customer level Qty to deliver (or I can also introduce Qty to invoice)
Basically order just needs to be invoiced or delivered. One of those two. Then other module will make sure that on customer level quantities invoiced equal to quantities delivered. Because you could also have random customer return (credit note) or other workflow that does not fit order workflow.
If someone wants to also make sure orders are both fully invoiced and fully delivered, I can introduce additional columns to track that. But Qty reserved is really what matters because it flows to inventory item quantities where we use it to calculate Qty available, Qty to be available, Qty to order etc.
In the end, it’s about creating proper model for inventory so it doesn’t fall apart no matter what is your workflow.
Here is an example: you are selling goods through retail. You are placing your goods with retailers but only getting paid when retailer sells.
So in this case, you are simply shipping goods to retailer (delivery notes) but they are not linked to any order. It’s only when retailer sells, they will advise you by issuing order which you can invoice. There is nothing to be delivered because goods have been already delivered. Just an example of real-world workflows out there.
If you mean introduction of columns on Sales Order tab then yes that is what i suggested to dont change the current invoice and delivery status (make it track actual deliveries like before) columns and introduce a new column “Order Status” which would work the way currently for Delivery Status column is working.
Or maybe introduce manual selection of status so if some orders shows undelivered but actually they are delivered you can change that manually too. Same for invoice in case you havent connected an invoice to order.
@lubos what i concluded is that you want things to be easier than to be linking each and every document to other. And there might be cases where a delivery note might contain items of two orders and delivery notes already doesn’t need to be connected to Invoices either.
Exactly. There are so many possible workflows. Sometime customer issues daily orders and you just want to ship them as soon as possible but are not concerned about invoicing until end of the month when you simply invoice the entire balance across all orders, customer returns etc.
And the opposite is also true. In volatile forex environments invoices and payments often need to occur before delivery or at point of delivery. So as you mentioned there are numerous workflows based on lots of factors.
