Getting Started with PO Workflow - Buyer Best Practices for Setting Up Your Account

The Mission

There are some tried and true ways that you can set up your account that will quickly help you gain efficiencies and start off running.  Things like common settings, column ordering, and when email notifications are and aren't sent.  We suggest that you familiarize yourself with these options - some are specific to each buyer, and some apply to the entire company.  We will call these out for each of the steps as we describe them below.

First - Let's Take a Look at Overall Account Settings

These are the settings that impact all planners, buyers, and watchers when they are altered. These are the kinds of things you'd consider "rules" for your business. These settings can only be changed by the account's owners and administrators.

To access these settings:

1.  Click on the little dropdown arrow next to your name on the top right hand side of the screen and select Account Settings

2.  You will see these options on the left-hand side of the screen.  To see your available options for each section, click on the section title.

Pro Tip:  If you are not sure what an option means, please ask support or search for an article that details that setting.  These settings could dramatically change your experience in SourceDay if you are not aware of the impact of the changes.

API Integration 

• Default Dashboard Sort: Due Date
  • Determines how records are sorted in your Purchase Orders tabs
• Default Radar: 7 days
  • This let's you know a deadline is coming up so that you can stay on top of potentially late orders before they are late
• Late Status: Due Date (default)
  
  • The Due Date is used to define when an order is "late"
    • When the due date is in the past, orders will show on the Late tab 
• Most important: see photo below - these options will impact how you and your suppliers use the platform to collaborate

ASN & Barcode Settings 

• "ASN On" is set to on
  • This will allow you to see shipment data as entered by your suppliers.  If this is not on, you will not be able to see the shipment information.

Email Notifications 

• Vendor Email Updates From POs
  • Live - You will receive an email notification as soon as any supplier change is made
  • Hourly (recommended) - You will receive a listing each hour of changes made
  • Daily -  You will receive a listing each day of changes made
  • Weekly - You will receive a listing each week of changes made
• Enable Email Forwarding 
  • If you want others to be copied on email notifications you receive regarding supplier PO changes, set this value to on, then enter the emails for those in your organization who should receive the notifications
• Tab Based Recurring Notifications (toggle and grid) - This determines if and the frequency your suppliers will receive notifications based on order line status.
  
  • For example, if you check the boxes for Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday for "Late", the supplier will receive reminders for orders in the late tab every Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday

• Active Vendors allows you to do several things:
  • See the ERP Vendor ID, Name, Contact and Email for your active suppliers
  • Disable tab based notifications for the Supplier (they would no longer receive notification based on the grid)
  • Disable automated action emails for the Supplier (they would no longer receive notifications for Updates and new POs)

Second - Let's Take a Look at Buyer Specific Settings

These are the options that only apply to you.  These are constructed in this manner because we know that the value of certain fields and ordering varies depending on the role you are performing.

The following columns should be enabled and organized together to give you instant insight to the details and status of your order lines.  You can adjust the columns displayed and the order in which they are displayed on the dashboard using Manage Columns.

Pro Tip:  If you do not follow any of the other suggestions below, you should at least enable "order status" and position it to be one of your first columns.  This column will help you understand why POs are in specific tabs and what actions are next needed.

• Vendor
• Buyer
• Days Aged
• Order Status - This column is often not enabled by buyers.  During training, we always enable this column and move it to the left side of the dashboard.  This information immediately lets buyers know why a particular action is not available on that order line (for example: Propose Changes is not an available action on pending orders.)  Additionally this column enables buyers to see immediately any proposed cancellations.  
• PO Identifying Information:
  • PO Number
  • PO Line
  • Disable NA Columns (like release or revision)
  • Item (P/N)
  • Vendor (P/N)
  • Description 
  • Other custom columns (size, color, H, W, etc)
• Order Values
  • Qty Ordered
  • Qty Prop
  • Qty Shipped
  • Qty Received
  • UM
• Cost Values
  • Cost
  • Cost Prop
• Date Values
  • Due Date
  • Vendor Commit 
  • Promise Date
  • Ship Date (if using)
• Other - but only if applicable
  • Warehouse
  • Ship to