Buying from suppliers

From a request to stock

Purchasing → Requisitions & Quotes

Buying follows one road: someone asks for stock, someone allowed approves it, suppliers quote, the best quote becomes a purchase order, the goods arrive and are checked, they go into stock, and the supplier's invoice is matched before anything is owed.

You can join the road anywhere. A small order can go straight to a purchase order; goods that turn up without an order can be received directly.

1. 1 Requisitions & Quotes → New requisition: list what is needed — finished pieces, bullion, stones or findings — and send it for approval.
2. 2 Approved: press Make RFQ, print it for your suppliers, and enter each quote as it comes. The comparison marks the cheapest supplier for every line and overall.
3. 3 Press Choose & order on the quote you want. The purchase order is made with that supplier's prices and terms.

Paid in money, or metal for metal

On money terms a line is worth its weight × the rate (plus wastage) and the making. On metal terms you owe the supplier the fine gold in the goods, plus wastage, in grams — and only the making in money.

Metal owed goes on the supplier's metal account, never mixed with money. Settle it later by giving them metal from a lot, or by fixing a rate, which turns the grams into money owed.

Receive, check and put into stock

Purchasing → Goods Received & QC

Goods received are weighed piece by piece. Nothing goes into stock, and nothing is owed, until each line has been checked.

At QC tick each piece that is good and type a reason for anything rejected. Enter the assay where a line was tested — the metal owed and its value then follow the assay, not the stamp. Part of a line can be accepted.

Freight, customs, insurance and other costs typed on the delivery are spread over the accepted goods by value, so every piece carries its landed cost.

Put into stock: pieces are tagged (and wait in QC if quality checks are on), bullion becomes a metal lot, stones go to loose stock and findings to their own stock. The order shows what is still to come.

Supplier invoices: 2-way and 3-way match

Record the supplier's invoice against the deliveries it covers. A 3-way match compares it with what was ordered and what was accepted at QC; a 2-way match compares it with the order only.

Within the difference allowed (Settings → Policies) anyone in purchasing can approve it. A bigger difference needs someone with the right to approve invoices that do not match. Only an approved invoice goes on the supplier's account.

Supplier accounts, payments and returns

Each supplier's page has two accounts: money (invoices, payments, returns, consignment sales) and metal (fine grams owed either way). Pay from the money account; settle metal from the metal account.

Goods already in stock that go back are a return to supplier: a debit note off what you owe them, or a refund into an account. Pieces bought on metal terms come off the metal account too.

What to Reorder lists designs below their minimum stock and findings below their reorder level; tick them to start a requisition.