How to Add a Supplier and Raise a Purchase Order in EDGEBIC

Purchasing in EDGEBIC is four moves on one screen: create the supplier, raise the order header, add lines carrying a promised date, and set the status that decides whether the scheduler believes any of it. Everything lives on the Purchasing sub-tab of the Inventory tab in EDGEBIC by User Solutions, and the whole flow takes a couple of minutes once the supplier exists.

This post covers the creation side. Booking goods in when they land is a separate job, covered in receiving against a purchase order line. It sits under the EDGEBIC planning guide.

Before You Start

You need three things.

The product must already exist. A purchase order line points at a product record, so a material you have never set up cannot be bought yet.

You need a real promised date from the supplier, or an honest estimate of one. This is the single figure the plan is built on.

And you need to know who the order is with, if you want either purchasing report to be able to tell you whose delivery is late.

Step 1: Create the Supplier

Open the Inventory tab, then the Purchasing sub-tab. The Suppliers panel sits on the right.

Click New. The quick-edit fields below the list clear, and you fill in four things.

Click Save. The grid refreshes and the status line confirms the save.

Lead days is the field to be careful about. It is a note, not a calculation. EDGEBIC does not add it to anything or offset a date by it. It exists so whoever raises the next order has a sensible number in front of them when they choose a promised date by hand. Treat it as a reminder and keep it honest, but never expect it to move a plan.

To edit a supplier later, click its row. The quick-edit fields prefill, you change what you need, and you click Save again. Retiring a supplier is the Active tick rather than a delete, which keeps the history of what you bought from them intact.

Step 2: Raise the Order Header

Click New PO. The header editor clears and the status line prompts you to save the header.

Click Save PO. The order appears in the master grid with itself selected, ready for lines.

Two of these deserve a second look. Order date is inert. The scheduler never reads it, which is exactly why it is easy to confuse with the date that does matter. That distinction is covered fully in why the promised date matters more than the order date.

Status is the one to get right. Only open and partially received orders feed inbound supply. A draft order supplies nothing, on the reasoning that a draft is intent rather than a commitment. Received supplies nothing because the goods are physical stock by then, and canceled supplies nothing by definition. Leaving a real order sitting in draft is the most common reason a plan ignores material that has genuinely been ordered, and it is the subject of I firmed my purchase orders and the schedule did not move.

The Include closed checkbox in the toolbar controls the list, not the scheduler. Leave it unticked for live orders, tick it to see received and canceled ones.

Step 3: Add Lines and Set the Promised Date

With the order selected, use the line-entry row beneath the grid.

Click Add line. The status line confirms it and the row appears in the line grid, sorted by promised date.

Repeat for every material on the order. To remove a line that has never been received against, select it and click Remove line. Once anything has arrived against a line, it becomes an audit record and cannot be removed.

The promised date is the whole point of this step. It is the date the scheduler pegs jobs to, and it is the only date it uses. The default of a week out is a placeholder, not a suggestion. Replace it with what the supplier actually said.

Step 4: Read the Line Grid

The grid below tells you where the order stands.

Remaining is the operative number. Not ordered, not received: the balance still inbound is what a job can be pegged to, which is why a partial delivery correctly leaves a job still waiting for the rest.

Overdue rows are drawn in amber and bold, so a scan down the grid tells you which promises have already slipped. Those are the calls to make before you publish a plan that depends on them.

How to Check It Worked

Run the schedule, then look at a job that needs the material. If the order is set up correctly, the job pegs to the promised date and the peg label names your order number. That is the round trip: header, line, date, peg. What that peg means is covered in what material pegging means in EDGEBIC.

For the whole inbound picture across every open order, run the Scheduled Receipts report as a pre-publish routine before you commit to dates.

Common Mistakes

Leaving the status in draft. The order exists, the line is right, the plan ignores it. Set it to open.

Accepting the default promised date. A week out is a placeholder. A plan built on a placeholder is a guess wearing a date.

Expecting lead days to do something. It is reference information on the supplier record. Only the promised date on the line reaches the scheduler.

Leaving the supplier blank. The order still works. Your ability to ask who is late does not.

Next Steps

Book the goods in when they arrive with receiving against a purchase order line, and read how projected balance drives a purchase decision for the question that should trigger the order in the first place.