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Sales Orders, Delivery and Drop-Shipping: Invoice What Was Actually Delivered

· 4 min read
eSecured ERP Team
eSecured ERP Team
eSecured Cloud Hosting & IT Services

A customer orders 600 bags of cement. You can send them on two of your own trucks, or ask the factory to deliver straight to the site. Either way, the questions that matter come later: was everything delivered? Did one truck arrive short? Has the order been invoiced, and for the right quantity? This guide shows how sales orders answer those questions without a phone call to the driver.

Start with a confirmed sales order​

Everything begins with a Sales Order: the customer, their own reference, the products, quantities and prices. Prices start at each item's selling price and are before VAT. VAT is added on the invoice. When the customer agrees, click ✓ Confirm Order.

From here, a confirmed order can be fulfilled in one of two ways.

One sales order, two ways to deliver it

Path 1: Deliver on your own trucks​

Use this when your fleet carries the goods.

  1. On the confirmed order, click + Link to Job / Trip.
  2. Pick the job, then click Link next to the trip that will carry the goods. Each trip shows its route, truck, driver and start date, so you can see which one is which.
  3. The order moves to Dispatched. The trip's delivery note can print the order's goods table, so the driver hands over a document that matches the order.
  4. When the driver delivers, record ✓ Confirm Delivery on the trip with the receiver's name and date. Once every linked trip is confirmed, the order moves to Delivered.

There's a bonus for transport companies that also sell goods: when the order's trips all belong to one job, the invoice is linked to that job. It counts toward the job's revenue and shows on the job's ledger, next to the fuel, allowances and other trip costs. You see the real profit on the delivery, not just the sale.

Path 2: Drop-ship from your supplier​

Use this when you buy the goods and the supplier ships them straight to your customer.

  1. On the confirmed order, click + Raise Drop-Ship PO and pick the supplier.
  2. A draft Purchase Order is created with the sales order's products and quantities. Its unit costs are zero, because you haven't agreed prices yet. Open it, click ✎ Edit, and enter the supplier's prices.
  3. Click Mark as Sent. If you forgot the prices, the system asks you to confirm before sending a zero-value order.
  4. When the supplier confirms delivery, record Receive Goods on that Purchase Order. The received quantities count as delivered on the sales order, and when everything has arrived the order moves to Delivered.

A sales order uses one path or the other, not both.

Invoice only what was delivered​

A fulfilled order shows four quantities on every line: ordered, dispatched, delivered and invoiced. When you click 🧾 Create Invoice, the invoice uses the delivered quantities wherever they've been recorded. If one truck arrived 20 bags short, the customer is billed for what they received, and nobody has to edit the invoice by hand.

You also decide when an order may be invoiced, in Settings → Invoicing → Sales Order Fulfillment:

Invoicing TriggerYou can invoice
Manual (default)once the order is Confirmed, Dispatched or Delivered
On Dispatchonce it's on its way
Full Deliveryonly when everything has been delivered

Businesses that bill on proof of delivery should choose Full Delivery. Then an invoice can never go out for goods still on the road.

Everything stays linked​

The invoice links back to its sales order, and the order lists its invoice with its status. With your own trucks, the job page shows the linked sales orders and invoices too. Anyone can follow a delivery from the customer's order to the truck to the money without searching three systems.

Getting it​

Sales Orders and Sales Order Fulfillment are options your service provider switches on for your company. Fulfillment adds the delivery tracking and both delivery paths. The own-trucks path links to jobs and trips from the Logistics module, and in the same settings screen you can choose which of the two paths your team is offered.