Introduction
The Purchase Invoice register is a record of your company's purchases. Each time you make a purchase, you will receive a Purchase Invoice from the Supplier, which you should enter to the Purchase Invoice register. You will therefore use this register is thus used for a number of tasks:
- The Purchase Invoice is a record of the payment demanded from your company by the Supplier;
- Unpaid Purchase Invoices in the register provide the basis for your creditor management reports; and
- Each Purchase Invoice causes a Nominal Ledger Transaction to be created, thus generating the overall purchase and creditor figures in your monthly and yearly management reports. This creation process is automatic, requiring no intervention or work from you.
Four types of purchase transaction can be recorded in the Purchase Invoice register:
- Standard Purchase Invoices are received where the goods have been delivered or work carried out before payment has been issued. Payments against such Purchase Invoices should be recorded in the Payment register.
- The Cash Note represents the issuing of a payment at the same time as the work is carried out. When a Cash Note is entered to the Purchase Invoice register, FirstOffice will treat it as having being paid, so there is no need to enter a separate payment record in the Payment register. FirstOffice will also look after the Nominal Ledger implications for you (crediting the Cash Account rather than the Creditor Account).
- A Deposit is the issuing of money before an Invoice has been received. Deposits are treated as Cash Notes in FirstOffice.
- Credit Notes are used to correct mistakes in Purchase Invoices, or to cancel Invoices that have been raised in error. They are, in effect, negative Invoices that reduce your overall purchase and creditor figures. Again, FirstOffice looks after these Nominal Ledger implications automatically.
The use of the Purchase Invoice register, including each of these types of purchase transaction, is now described in detail. Before you start entering Purchase Invoices, however, you must ensure that you have defined the current (accounting) year, using the
Fiscal Years setting.
To open the Purchase Invoice register, click the [Purchase Inv] button in the Master Control panel or use the Ctrl-3 (Windows and Linux) or ⌘-3 (Macintosh) keyboard shortcuts.
The 'Purchase Invoices: Browse' window is opened, showing Purchase Invoices that have already been entered.
Purchase Invoices are given a unique internal identifying code, using a consecutive numbering system. This is in addition to any number allocated to the Invoice by the issuer (the Supplier). The internal number is shown in the left-hand column, followed by a check mark (if the Purchase Invoice is approved), the Supplier's Invoice Number, the issue date and finally by the Supplier Number and Name. Credit Notes have the letter "C" in the Name column, after the Supplier's Name.
As in all browse windows you can change the sort order by clicking on the column headings. To reverse any sort, simply click once again on the column heading. You can also scroll the list with the scroll bars. Finally, you can search for a record by entering a keyword in the field at the bottom left corner. FirstOffice will search for the first record matching the keyword in the same column as the selected sorting order.
