Advice needed for billing

[Maf. King]

On Thursday 07 April 2011 14:33:14 Timothy Wight wrote:
> I am struggling to use the vendor billing for suppliers that require
> advance payment.  The business process is as follows:
>
> 1)	We place an order for multiple items.  The vendor either replies with
> a pro-forma invoice OR (more often) we are ordering using an online
> system and know the order value immediately.
> 2)	Our overseas suppliers terms are usually 'payment with order' so We
> transfer funds (make payment?) for the order value.
> 3)	At a later date the supplier ships those items he can fulfil from
> stock and issues an invoice for the shipment.
> 4)	At further date/s the supplier ships back order items when available
> and issues one or more invoices for these shipments.
> 5)	If the back order delay for an item is too great for our purpose we
> may cancel the item, or adjust the quantity.
>
> So the final collection of invoices are likely not to match the order
> value.  Some items can be shipped/invoiced after subsequent orders
> placed and paid.  This is further complicated by the use of currency
> trading accounts and exchange rate changes throughout.
>
> Can anybody offer any advice how to achieve this?
>

Hi,

I don't use the vendor bills approach when I buy something which requires 
up-front payment.  IMHO, such a transaction defeats the point of Accounts 
Payables!

I just put a transaction directly between Bank:Current and Expenses:Widgets 
(and split the VAT off manually into VAT_Inputs)

HTH,
Maf.