Receive stock from a purchase order

When a vendor delivers against your purchase order, receive it in Service Buddy to bring your stock counts back up to date. You record what actually arrived line by line, so a partial delivery is a normal, tidy event rather than something you have to work around.

Before you start

The PO must be Open, Approved, or Partially Received. A Rejected or Completed PO can’t be received against.

Steps

From the main menu, click Purchase Orders.
Open the PO for the delivery you’re receiving.
Click More Actions in the top-right → Receive. (You can also use More Actions → Change Status and set Status to Received — the Receive Items window opens straight away.)
Set the Received Date — it defaults to today and can’t be a future date.
Add a Delivery Note reference if the vendor gave you one (for example, DN-88421). Optional, but it’s what you’ll search for when a vendor queries an invoice later.
Check each line in the Line Items table. It shows Ordered, Received so far, and Remaining, so you always know what’s still outstanding. Receiving Now starts at the full remaining quantity — lower it if less arrived. You can’t receive more than what’s remaining.
Check the Location on each line — where the stock is being put away. It starts at the location the line was ordered for; pick a different store or warehouse if the goods went somewhere else, or No location to add them to the product’s overall stock only.
Check the summary under the table — how many lines and units you’re receiving, and what the PO status becomes.
Click Receive Inventory.

What happens next

On-hand stock goes up by the quantities you received, immediately — at the location you chose on each line. If the product wasn’t stocked at that location yet, the location is added to the product’s Stock by Location.
The PO status becomes Partially Received if anything is still outstanding, or Received once every product line is fully accounted for.
The receipt is added to the PO’s receiving history with the date, location, who received it, and the delivery note reference.
The PO stays receivable while it’s Partially Received, so the next delivery is just another receipt.
If the PO was raised from a quote, job, or invoice, the matching lines on that document pick up the location the stock was received into, so the reserved stock is held in the right place.

Products set up automatically on receipt

Receiving makes sure every product you receive is counted in inventory:

A Non-Inventory product is switched to Inventory when you receive it, with automatic inventory deduction turned on, so the stock you just brought in is counted from now on.
If a product on the PO has since been deleted from your catalog, receiving adds it back as a product so the stock has somewhere to go.

Receiving into different locations

The Location column decides where each line’s stock goes. Use it when a delivery lands somewhere other than where you ordered it for — the order was for the showroom, but the truck dropped it at the warehouse.

Service Buddy flags any line you’re receiving at a different location than it was ordered for.
If the PO covers a quote, job, or invoice, that document keeps its reservation at the ordered location. Receiving elsewhere leaves that reservation unfilled until you move the stock — see Track inventory levels.
If the PO ships directly to a customer’s or vendor’s address, the location can’t be changed in the Receive Items window.

To split one line across two locations — say 30 cartons to the warehouse and 10 to the showroom — receive it in two passes: receive 30 into the warehouse, then open Receive again and receive the remaining 10 into the showroom. Each pass is its own receipt.

Partial deliveries

Half the rolls arrive Tuesday, the rest follow two weeks later. Receive what turned up:

Lower Receiving Now to the quantities that actually arrived, and set it to zero on lines that didn’t arrive at all.
Click Receive Inventory. The PO moves to Partially Received.
When the balance arrives, receive again. Receiving Now starts at what’s still remaining, so you’re never recalculating by hand.

Each delivery is recorded as its own receipt, so you keep a dated trail of exactly what came when.

Closing the PO

Received means the goods are in. Completed means you’re finished with the order — invoice reconciled, nothing more expected.

To close it, open the PO → More Actions → Change Status → Completed, and set the Order Completion Date.

Close a PO short if the vendor is never going to ship the rest. It stays fully viewable for audit history.

Receiving history

Every PO keeps a record of what was received against it, showing for each line:

Column	What it shows
Line Item	The product received
Location	Where that stock was put away
Qty	How much was received in that delivery
Received Date	When that delivery arrived
Received By	Who recorded it
Delivery Note	The vendor’s reference for that shipment

A PO with nothing received yet shows No receipts yet.

Damaged or incorrect goods

If items arrive damaged or wrong:

Lower Receiving Now so you receive only what’s actually usable.
Add a note on the PO describing the issue.
Contact the vendor for a credit or replacement shipment.
When replacements arrive, receive them against the same PO.

FAQ

What happens to my inventory when I receive?

On-hand quantities go up by exactly what you received on each line, immediately, at the location you chose. You’ll see the change on the Settings → Products & Services list. A Non-Inventory product is switched to Inventory when it’s received. If auto-deduct is on for those items, future jobs and invoices draw down from the new stock.

How do I handle a partial delivery?

Lower Receiving Now to the quantities that arrived and set the rest to zero. The PO moves to Partially Received and stays receivable — when the balance turns up, receive against the same PO again. You don’t need to split it into a second PO, though you still can if your accounting prefers a separate order for a long-delayed balance.

What’s the difference between Received and Completed?

Received is about the goods — every line has arrived. Completed is about the order — you’re done with it and expect nothing further. A PO you’ve closed short (the vendor cancelled the balance) goes straight to Completed without ever being fully Received.

Can I receive the same PO more than once?

Yes. Each delivery is its own receipt with its own date and delivery note. The Remaining column tracks what’s left, so repeat deliveries need no mental arithmetic.

Why can’t I enter a quantity against a line?

Either the line is fully received already (Remaining is zero), or it’s a service line — labor, freight, and install don’t carry stock so they aren’t receivable. You also can’t receive more than a line’s Remaining quantity.

Can I receive stock into a specific store or warehouse?

Yes. Each line in the Receive Items window has a Location. It starts at the location the line was ordered for; change it to wherever the goods actually landed. To split one line across locations, receive part of it into one location, then receive the rest into another. See Receiving into different locations.

I made a receiving mistake — how do I fix it?

Receipts can’t be edited or deleted, so correct the stock on the affected product instead: open it in Settings → Products & Services, click Adjust Stock, and remove the extra quantity with Data correction as the reason. If it went into the wrong location, choose Transferred to location to move it. The adjustment is recorded in the product’s history, so the audit trail stays clear. For a whole PO received against the wrong items, contact support.

How do I track which roll, carton, or box came from which PO?

For carpet rolls, hardwood lots, LVP cartons, and tile batches, many retailers put the roll, lot, or batch number in the PO line item description or a custom field. The description carries through to inventory, so you can trace any roll back to its PO and mill. This matters most for hardwood and tile, where dye-lot matching drives color consistency.

Why can’t I receive this PO?

Check its status. Only Open, Approved, and Partially Received POs can be received against — a Rejected or Completed one can’t.