The Procurement flow

In following best practice design, Compiere facilitates the Procurement flow as shown follows:

The specific entry point into the Procurement cycle is very flexible and documents do not initially have to link to each other. In effect, you do not require a Purchase Order to have an Accounts Payable (AP) Invoice or a Material Receipt. How the procurement cycle transactional document flow is linked and implemented for an organization is entirely flexible. In this process however, the Purchase Order is the control document and it is a best practice that as a minimum a Purchase Order always be created to start the procurement cycle, because this is the typical legal instruction required by a Vendor in order to commence a procurement transaction.

The transaction windows for this process in Compiere are found under the Procurement menu item:

Processing Products setup as items (stocked or non-stocked) and setting up Products as service items is exactly the same. The difference...