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Purchase orders for franchises
Purchase orders for franchises

For franchise owners

Rebecca avatar
Written by Rebecca
Updated over a week ago

In this article:

  • How purchase orders work for franchises

  • Set up franchises and suppliers

  • Sending purchase orders

  • Revising purchase orders

  • Stocking in purchase orders

  • Reading purchase orders

If you're not a franchise, see this article instead.

How purchase orders work for franchises

When you have a multiple Abacus accounts as a franchise, your franchisees' purchase orders trigger a series of of actions

The basic procedure:

  1. Set up franchises and suppliers

  2. Franchise sends purchase order to HQ

  3. HQ receives purchase order

  4. HQ automatically creates a new purchase order to send to the supplier

  5. HQ sends invoice to franchise

  6. The supplier fulfils the order

  7. Franchise stocks in order

Set up franchises and suppliers

  1. Contact the Abacus Team to set up your HQ account with its franchises. You will know that you have all your franchises set up properly if you go to Sites and see them listed. You can visit each site by clicking the icon indicated. Make sure you let the team know that you want purchase orders to go from child sites, through HQ, to the suppliers.

2. Go to Stock Management > Suppliers

3. Create a Supplier

4. Make sure you fill in:

  • Supplier’s e-mail address, because this is where the purchase orders will be sent

  • Linked Encrypted ID, to be found on the Company Profile.

Sending purchase orders

Franchise sends purchase order to HQ

From the franchise account...

  1. Go to Purchases > Purchase Order

  2. Click New Order

3. Select the Supplier
4. Save

5. Add the Products
6. Save

A purchase order will be sent to the HQ email. An invoice will be created in HQ to be sent manually to the franchise.

HQ receives the purchase order

The e-mail that is registered with the HQ account will receive a purchase order (pdf) from the franchise.

This step can be skipped by toggling “No” in Purchase Order > Settings > HQ Receive Email from Site.

HQ automatically creates and sends a new purchase order to the supplier

  1. The supplier email that is registered with the HQ account will receive a purchase order (pdf) from the HQ account

  2. The supplier must follow a link to approve it. This step can be skipped by toggling “No” in Purchase Order > Settings > Show Approval Link in email.

HQ sends invoice to franchise

In the HQ account...

  1. Go to Sales > Invoices

  2. The “customer” will be the franchise. Click the pencil button to open the invoice details.

3. Go to More > Send PDF As Email

4. The franchise will receive an email with the invoice attached

5. When the franchise has paid, update the invoice by clicking Mark As Paid.

Revising purchase orders

Purchase orders can be changed from the HQ account and from the franchise account.

  1. Go to Purchases > Purchase Order

2. Go to Purchase Order Details

3. Make changes

4. Purchase Order Log will update

5. Save, and the purchase order will update immediately.

  • For new items and quantity changes, a notification email will be sent to the franchise, HQ, and supplier

  • For price changes, a notification email will be sent to HQ and the franchise

The supplier fulfils the order

Supplier sends stock to franchise directly. This occurs outside of Abacus.

Stocking in purchase orders

When the order has been received by franchise, in the franchise account...

  1. Go to Purchases > Purchase Order

2. Click the Stock In button (+).

3. Change the quantity or price (if required).

4. Stock In.

Reading purchase orders

The HQ account can see all purchase orders created by each franchise site
The purchase order number will indicate which franchise it belongs to and when the order was made. 

Contact Abacus for a list of your franchise's company numbers so you can interpret your purchase order numbers.

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