A Sales Order is a Transaction that is used to record the job specifications of a client with the business. It contains the products, items, and services, with values, that are to be processed. A Sales Order can be copied from an approved Quotation, or it can be created from scratch. A Sales Order can be copied to other down stream transactions - such as a Work Order for production, or a Customer Invoice if the product or service has been provided. It informs production, or inventory, or your suppliers, or accounting, of what to you should produce for, or supply to, or invoice the client.

This topic covers how to setup a Sales Order Transaction Type.

All of these fields and tabs are explained in detail in the Transaction Type topic, here.

What you'll find on this page

• • Start here

• Transaction Types

  • General

  • Items & Inventory

  • Estimating

  • Item Entity

  • Production

  • Custom Fields

• Status

• Copy Rules

• Templates

• Categories

• Costing Rules

• Reporting

• Approval

Start here

1. Navigate to Setup > Transaction Types > Edit.

2. Click Add. A new record will appear at the bottom of the screen. You will note that some fields are auto-populated already.

Transaction Types

General

The defaults for Transaction Types only require a small amount of change. The only fields to change are:

1. Description - Enter 'Sales Order'.

2. Code - Enter 'SO'. This is the 'nickname' of the Transaction Type.

3. Contacts - Select Customers - Active. This is so that users will only be able to create a new Sales Order for customers if their accounts are up to date and they have not exceeded their credit limits.

4. Staff - Select Rep & Assign to. This ensures that the Sales Order can be access by the Sales Rep who created the quotation, and by the person the Sales Order is assigned to down the line.

5. Create / Copy - Select Create New & Copy in order to create Sales Orders directly, or copy from Estimates.

Items & Inventory

As above, there is minimal change required here. More on Items & Inventory here.

These will depend entirely on the nature of the business you are setting up.

• Resolve Items - The selection made here will determine what items are available on the Sales Order.

  • Reserve - Select this if you need to issue from Stock.

  • Purchase - Select this if you need to purchase items or order items from a Supplier.

  • Produce - Select this if you manufacture your own items, or provide complex services - for example, an events company.

Estimating

• Pricing - Select Cost Price if this is applicable to the business's estimating model.

Item Entity

If this Item is an Entity, then select the Entity settings here.

• Caption - Enter the label of caption of this Entity Item.

• Position - Select if this field should be left, centre, or right on the Sales Order's header.

• Category Filter - Select the Item Category here.

Production

• Timekeeping - Select 'Transaction'. This is used to set what users see when they try and log time, so we set it to 'Transaction' to prevent a transaction coming up multiple times on Tracker in the event that it has multiple records.

Custom Fields

The defaults for Custom Fields for a new Sales Order Transaction Type only require a small amount of change. More on Custom Fields here.

The only field to change is:

1. Caption for Due Date - Set to Required date.

Status

Drive the Transaction through the business processes through Status settings.

Copy Rules

These are dependent on the other Transaction Types that need to be linked to Sales Orders. For a more indepth explanation of Copy Rules, click here.

1. Sales Orders to Customer Deposits - Use this to copy the items and prices to a linked customer deposit transaction in order to track the receipt of money towards this Sales Order.

2. Sales Orders to Customer Invoices - This allows you to invoice the customer immediately and directly for the work or products commissioned in the Sales Order.

3. Sales Orders to Delivery Notes - This allows you to create a delivery note linked to the Sales Order, with the linked client delivery details, directly from the Sales Order.

4. Sales Orders to Goods Issued - This allows you to create a Goods Issued transaction linked to this Sales Order, to track what reserved items have been issued against the SO. This also updates inventory levels.

5. Sales Orders to Purchase Orders - This allows you to instantly create a Purchase Order linked to this Sales Order for items that need to be purchased in order to fulfill the Sales Order. This is linked to Supplier and Item records.

6. Sales Orders to Work Orders - This allows you to instantly create a Work Order for items that need to be produced. This creates tasks on the Planning Board against the stations that have been setup for the business.

Templates

The following templates can be setup for Sales Orders. More on Templates here.

1. Order Confirmation - This allows you to print or email a confirmation of the order that has been created for the client. If the business deals with foreign currency, the Order Confirmation can show the foreign currency values, without VAT. The Order Confirmation can also be set to display the full job specifications.

2. Pro Forma - This allows you to produce an abridged or estimated invoice in advance of a shipment or delivery of goods. It notes the kind and quantity of goods, their value, and other important information such as weight and transportation charges. Pro forma invoices are commonly used as preliminary invoices with a quotation, or for customs purposes in importation. They differ from a normal invoice in not being a demand or request for payment. They can be set to show foreign currencies without VAT, as well as to show the full job specifications, as shown in the image below.

Categories

More on Categories here.

• Click Add to create a custom job Category - such as Equipment Rental, or Marketing Services.

• Click on the drop down arrow next to Add, to add all Categories from another Transaction Type. This ensures that - if another Transaction Type has already been set up - then you can use those Categories for quicker setup.

Costing Rules

Costing Rules indicate where costs for Issued Stock, Returned Stock, etc are allocated from. So if you copy a SO to Goods Issued, then the cost of the issued stock (your cost of sales) will be allocated from the linked Goods Issued transaction. More on Costing Rules here.

Ideally these other Transactions that can be linked to a Sales Order Costing Rule have been created already.

1. Stock Issued > Goods Issued (GI) - The costs of the issued stock are allocated against the linked Goods Issued transaction.

2. Stock Returned > Goods Returned (GRT) - The costs of the returned stock are allocated against the linked Goods Returned transaction.

3. Purchases > Purchase Orders (PO) - The costs of the purchases are allocated against the linked Purchase Orders transaction.

4. Timekeeping > Sales Orders (SO) - The cost of labour are allocated against the linked Sales Order.

5. Timekeeping > Work Orders (WO) - The costs of labour are allocated against the linked Work Order.

Reporting

There are two reports to setup - Customer Age Analysis, and Customer Summary.

• Customer Age Analysis

This is an instant statement of a customer against time. More on Customer Age Analysis here.

You can add Sales Orders here to show as Work in Progress (WIP) on your Customer Age Analysis. This is also a way to ensure that the customer doesn't exceed their credit limit, by checking against their outstanding invoices and work currently in production.

• Customer Summary

This is an instant summary of customer transactions over time. More on Customer Summaries here.

You can add Sales Orders here to show the orders that have been received on the Customer Summary.

Approval

If Supervisor approval is required for Sales Orders to move to the next Transaction Status for a certain amount, set it here.