POs suppliers take seriously
The PO is the contract of the everyday. Its template exists to prevent the three classic disputes: what was ordered, at what price, by when.
What it must contain
- PO number — the reference every later document cites
- Supplier and ship-to details
- Items with quantities, units and agreed prices
- Expected delivery date
- Authorization — who approved this commitment
- Terms reference
SeroBooks POs carry approval control and are received against by GRNs — the dispute-prevention is structural.
The mistakes that cost money
A purchase order without a delivery date and a clear ship-to location is an order you cannot chase. One without agreed prices is an invitation to be billed at whatever the supplier's list says on the day.
The costly omission is usually the PO number itself — if it does not travel onto the supplier's invoice, matching what arrived against what you ordered becomes a manual hunt through a filing tray.
When a template stops being enough
Partial deliveries break templates immediately. Order 100, receive 60, and the document is now wrong: it says 100, reality says 60, and the outstanding 40 lives in someone's head or a pencil annotation.
That is the point at which orders want to track their own balance, and where a goods received note becomes the independent record of what actually turned up — which is the document that settles supplier claims.
Templates are training wheels. The software is the bicycle.
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