Entering purchases, and what you owe suppliers

Goods arriving is not just a shelf being filled. Entering a consignment fixes three things at once: stock goes up, cost prices are updated, and what you owe that supplier is recorded.

So enter the consignment when the goods arrive. Adjusting stock by hand never fixes the other two.

Entering one

Start a new purchase on the purchases screen. What it needs:

1. Supplier — who it came from. Add a new one right there if you need to.
2. Invoice number and date — whatever is on the paper. These two are what you match against later.
3. Product, quantity and cost — on each line.
4. How much you paid — all of it, some of it, or none.

Save it and the stock goes up by itself.

About the cost price

Whatever you enter on the consignment becomes that product's new cost. This is where your profit figures come from, so put in the real number rather than an approximation.

Buy the same thing twice at two prices and the system averages them by quantity. Ten at 100 and ten at 120 leaves that product costing 110 — which is what it actually cost you.

Where there is freight or loading to pay, put it in the consignment's charges rather than burying it in the unit price, so you can still see what carriage is costing you.

What you owe

Anything you did not pay sits against that supplier as a balance. It is the mirror image of the customer khata — there you are owed, here you owe.

The suppliers screen shows who is owed what, and how old it is. Read that list once a month. Paying suppliers on time is the cheapest way there is to keep getting a good price next time.

Orders and consignments are different

Some applications let you raise a purchase order first. An order means "this is coming" — stock does not move yet. When the goods arrive, turn that order into a consignment rather than typing it a second time.

The real benefit shows up in reordering: goods already on their way are counted, so you are not told to order something you have already ordered.

If you enter one wrongly

Open it and correct it — do not delete it and start again. Deleting leaves a hole in the stock history, and three months later, when the stock does not add up, there is no way to find out why.