Purchase orders for materials and subcontractors

Purchase orders (POs) let your business track what you plan to spend on materials, parts, and subcontractor services before costs arrive. They are an internal tool — suppliers and customers do not see them. When a PO is fulfilled, the cost is automatically logged against the job so your profitability report stays accurate.

Who can use purchase orders?

The business owner and dispatchers can create, manage, and fulfil purchase orders. Technicians cannot access POs — they log costs using the expense logging tool during the job.

Creating a purchase order

1. Open the job from your jobs list.
2. Scroll to the Purchase orders section (below the Job costs section — visible to owners and dispatchers only).
3. Click "New PO".
4. Fill in the PO details:
   • Supplier / subcontractor name — who you are ordering from.
   • Description — what is being ordered (e.g. "15mm copper pipe fittings, 100 units").
   • Quantity and estimated unit cost — TruePro calculates the estimated total.
   • Expected delivery date — optional, helps track when goods are due.
   • Notes — any reference numbers, special instructions, or supplier quote numbers.
5. Click "Create purchase order". The PO is saved as a draft.

Submitting a PO for approval

Drafts are visible only within your business and do not trigger any actions until submitted.

1. Open the PO and click "Submit PO".
2. If your business has an approval threshold set (see below), and the PO total exceeds it, the PO is sent to the business owner for approval before it can proceed.
3. If the PO is below the threshold (or no threshold is set), it is automatically approved.

PO approval threshold

The business owner can set a spend threshold that triggers approval for high-value POs. To configure it:

1. Go to Settings > Availability & Settings.
2. Under "Job defaults", enter your approval threshold in the "Purchase order approval threshold" field (enter in whole rands, e.g. 5000 for R 5,000).
3. Save. POs above this total will require your explicit approval going forward.

If no threshold is set, all POs are auto-approved on submission.

Approving a PO (owner only)

When a PO is pending your approval:

1. Open the job, scroll to the Purchase orders section, and click "View" on the pending PO.
2. Review the details, then click "Approve".
3. The PO status changes to approved and is ready to be fulfilled.

Fulfilling a PO (goods received)

When the goods arrive or the supplier invoice lands, mark the PO as fulfilled:

1. Open the approved PO.
2. Click "Mark as fulfilled (goods received)" and confirm.
3. TruePro automatically creates a cost entry under Job costs using the PO's description and estimated unit cost. The job profitability report is updated immediately.
4. The PO status changes to fulfilled and is locked from further edits.

If the actual cost differs from the estimate, you can manually adjust the cost entry in the Job costs section after fulfilling the PO.

Cancelling a PO

You can cancel any open PO (draft, pending approval, or approved) by opening it and clicking "Cancel PO". Cancelled POs are not deleted — they remain in the list for audit purposes but do not affect job costs.