Create a purchase order

What a purchase order is for

A purchase order (PO) is the order you send a supplier before they deliver. It says exactly what you want, how many, and at what price. Later, when the supplier bills you, you record that as a supplier invoice. So the PO is step one, and the supplier invoice comes after.

Purchase Orders sit in the Purchases section. You get them on the Team and Complete plans.

💡If the owner switched on "Purchase orders need approval" (Business → Team & permissions, under Approval safeguards), the save button reads Send for approval and an order you raise saves as awaiting approval — it cannot be sent to the supplier yet. Whoever has approve rights sees it under Needs you today on the dashboard and at the top of the Purchase Orders list, opens it, and approves or rejects it — rejecting asks them for a reason. Once approved it becomes a normal pending order you can send. If yours is rejected, it stays on the list with a red rejected badge and the reason inside; tap Got it — dismiss once read, and raise a fresh one if it should still happen.

Find a purchase order

Search purchase orders — type any part of the supplier's name or the PO number.
Show ▾ — pick a status (awaiting approval, pending, acknowledged, fulfilled, rejected or cancelled), who raised it (once two or more people have — everyone's, yours or one person's), and When (this month, last month or this tax year). Each choice shows how many orders it would leave.
Sort ▾ — newest first (the default) or oldest first, supplier A → Z or Z → A, total highest or lowest first, or PO number.
Show ▾ → Billing → 📦 On order, not billed yet — the orders you have placed that no supplier invoice has been captured against, so money you have committed to that is not on your books yet. The 📄 PDF and 📊 CSV / Excel buttons under that list print them, with how long ago each was ordered and what is past the delivery date you asked for.
On any other view of the list, 📄 PDF and 📊 CSV / Excel print the orders as you have them: number, date, supplier, the delivery date you asked for, status, whether a supplier invoice has been captured against it (Billed? — shown to people who can see Supplier Invoices), the amount before VAT, the VAT and the total, with a total line.

Before you start

It helps to have your supplier saved under Suppliers first, so you can pick them from a list. If they are not saved yet, you can just type the supplier name.
If you are VAT-registered, make sure your VAT number is set in Business details, under Tax & SARS. Once it is set, your PO works out and shows the VAT for you.

Create a purchase order

Open Purchase Orders in the Purchases section.
Tap the + New button at the top right. The New purchase order screen opens.
Fill in the Supplier. To pick a saved supplier, tap the 👤 List button next to the box, search and choose from the list. If the supplier is not saved, just type their name in the box.
Check the Issue date. It fills in with today's date, but you can change it.
If you have a delivery date in mind, set Requested delivery date. You can leave this blank.
Under Line items, tap + Add line item to add a blank line (or pick one from Add from your items), then type a Description and fill in the Qty and the Unit price (R). The Line total works out for you. Each line also has an amber 🏷️ Set category tag — tap it and pick the SARS heading the line belongs under. Every real line needs one, or the order won't save. Pick the supplier from the 👤 List and, if they have a usual category, every line you add after that starts filled in for you.
Add a line for each item you need. Use the red ✕ on a line to remove it.
Check the orange totals box. It shows the Subtotal and, if you are VAT-registered, the VAT and the PO total.
Tap Save purchase order. Not ready to finish it? Tap Save as draft instead (see Keep a purchase order as a draft, below).

💡The PO number (like PO-2026-0001) is taken for you when you save. The year in it is the year of the Issue date. You do not type it in. If a save is refused, no number is used up.

Keep a purchase order as a draft

A draft is a purchase order you have started and not finished. It has no PO number until you issue it, it has not gone for approval, and nothing counts it: no report, list of open orders or bill sees it.

Save as draft, under the main button, keeps what you have typed. A supplier or one line is enough. Nothing is checked yet, no number is used and no approval starts.
Preview draft shows how the purchase order will look. It is on the screen only: it says DRAFT, has no number, and can't be shared or printed.
Issue purchase order is the main button when a draft is open. It checks the order, gives it the next PO number, saves it and takes the draft away, all in one go. If your business needs approval and you can't approve, the order is saved as awaiting approval at this moment, not before. If something is wrong you are told, no number is used and the draft stays.
The issue date of a draft opens as today. You can change it: a purchase order is not a tax invoice, so it can carry any day.
Delete draft throws the draft away. Nothing is kept of it.
The Issued | Drafts switch, above the purchase order list, shows your issued orders, or your drafts with who started each one and when. Tap a draft to finish it. Drafts also show in To finish.
A draft that is 7 days old is nudged in To finish and in the Drafts list. Drafts never expire.
If you may only look at purchase orders, tap a draft to see its lines. You can't change, issue or delete it.
When you issue a draft, the new purchase order opens.
Drafts are not offered from Quick Log. Supplier bills have no drafts.

Send the PO to your supplier

Worklog does not email for you. To send a PO, open it and use the sharing buttons.

In the Purchase Orders list, tap the PO you want. It opens showing the supplier, dates, line items and total.
Tap 📄 PDF for a neat PDF, or 📊 CSV / Excel for a spreadsheet. On a phone, each button opens your phone's share menu with the file attached, so you can send it on WhatsApp or email, or save it to your files. On a computer it downloads.

Ask a supplier where an order is

Open a purchase order that is Pending or Acknowledged and tap Ask the supplier on WhatsApp. The message names the order and the delivery date you asked for. If that date has passed, it asks when the order will arrive.
It needs the supplier's phone number on their contact.

The four PO states

Every PO carries a status, shown as a small tag on the card in the list and at the top when you open it. It moves through these as the order progresses:

Pending: a brand-new PO you have just saved. You have ordered but the supplier has not confirmed yet.
Acknowledged: the supplier has confirmed they got the order and will supply it.
Fulfilled: the goods have been delivered and the order is complete.
Cancelled: the order was called off and will not go ahead.

Update the status as things happen

Tap the PO in the list to open it.
While it is Pending you will see two buttons: tap 👍 Acknowledged once the supplier confirms, or ✕ Cancel PO if the order falls away.
Once it is Acknowledged, open it again and tap ✅ Mark Fulfilled when the goods arrive.

💡While a PO is still Pending you can also fix its contents: open it and tap ✏️ Edit purchase order to change the supplier, the dates or the line items, then save. That button only shows while the PO is Pending — once it is Acknowledged, Fulfilled or Cancelled it falls away. Editing keeps the same PO number.

⚠️There is no undo for status changes. Once a PO is Cancelled or Fulfilled, those buttons fall away, so only change the status once the thing has actually happened.

💡After a PO is fulfilled and the supplier bills you, record that under Supplier Invoices. That is what captures your input VAT and your actual costs, not the PO itself.

Still stuck? Open the in-app help assistant, or email us at hello@worklogsolutions.co.za.

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