Use smart buyer

Overview

Smart Buyer consolidates transactions you have made and suggests what Purchases should be made.

Smart Buyer looks at all stock across your company, regardless of branch. If you require branch level detail, it may be better to use the re-order or replenishment reports.

There are a few prerequisites for the Smart Buyer to work. Products to be purchased must:

Have either FIFO, Batch or Serial stock control methods.
Have a preferred supplier assigned to them.

Smart Buyer will suggest restocking products that are low in stock or out of stock. You can use Smart Reorder with ForesightAI to predict and order your future stock requirements.

Purchase based on sales

The Smart Buyer can create a Purchase Order for items that have been sold but are out of stock. This includes Bill of Materials (BOM) items.

Let's assume you have already created a Sales Order for a number of items, all of which are out of stock. Each item is sold to you by a different supplier. You will need to create a Purchase for each product from each supplier.

To purchase these products:

From the left navigation, select Purchases, then Smart Buyer.
Change the Stock Status filter to Open Sales Orders - No Stock to Meet Sale.
Make sure the Group By filter is set to Supplier.
Search Suppliers for a specific supplier and review the products suggested.
In the far left column, you can adjust the reorder quantity for each product. Smart buyer will suggest different amounts depending on the selected Stock Status.
Click New Purchase Order to create a new purchase.
A new purchase order will be created with the products from the Smart Buyer.
Finally, approve the Purchase Order to create an open Purchase.

This process should be repeated until all stock has been purchased.

Purchase based on production

The Smart Buyer can also look at Production Jobs, and suggest purchases for those materials of which you are out of stock. This includes Bill of Materials (BOM) items.

Whilst in the Smart Buyer, change the Stock Status filter to Open Production Jobs - Materials Out of Stock.
Each new Purchase Order will be grouped by the supplier.
Find a supplier and review the products suggested. Click New Purchase Order to purchase them.
A new purchase order will be created with the products from the Smart Buyer.

This process should be repeated until all stock has been purchased.

Filters

Last stock count

Filter by the stock numbers between certain dates.

Last transaction

Filter for transactions made between two dates.

Search suppliers

This field enables you to filter the list by a particular supplier. You need only type the first three letters for suggestions to appear.

Search products

This enables you to filter the list by a particular product. You need only type the first three letters for product suggestions to appear.

Group by

You can choose to group by Supplier or by Order Ref.
When grouped by supplier, all products that are required to be purchased are grouped by supplier - this is useful for creating a purchase for one particular supplier.

Grouping by Order Ref will group the purchases that are required by order - useful if you want to make a separate purchase for each order.

Type

We recommend leaving this setting to All Suppliers.

Stock status

This is the primary filter that you will use to change the function of the Smart Buyer. The functions are as follows:

Function	Explanation
Open Sales Orders - No Stock to Meet Sale	Looks at all Sales Orders that have been created without stock to fulfil them.
Open Sales Orders - With Buy to Order or Dropship	Filters for all products that are out of stock and have been assigned Order Type 'Buy to Order' or 'Dropship' or the line items within the Sales Orders have been assigned 'Buy to Order' or 'Dropship'.
All Open Sales Orders	Shows products for all open sales orders, regardless of stock numbers.
Open Production Jobs - Materials Out of Stock	Filters all products required to be purchased in order for open production jobs to be completed.
All Stock	Shows all products, regardless of stock numbers.
Stock Available less than Min Stock Level	Shows all products where the stock availability is lower than the minimum stock level. Smart Buyer will suggest you reorder that minimum stock level amount.
Stock Less then Min - Order to Reorder Level	Shows all products where the stock on hand is lower than the reorder level. Smart Buyer recommends a reorder quantity that will increase your stock on hand to the reorder level.

Order ref

This field enables you to filter the list by a particular order reference number.

Link transactions

When a purchase is created, transactions can be linked to each related Purchase Order. This can be done at a detailed level (select Itemise) or a basic level (select Basic).

Rows per page

Determines the number of rows that are shown per page. More rows may affect load times.

Export

Exports the line items into a .CSV file.

FAQs

Are products purchased through the Smart Buyer reserved for their related sales/production jobs?

Even if products have been purchased through the Smart Buyer, they are not 'reserved' - they can be used to dispatch through any Sales Order or Production Job.

Once a Purchase Order has been received, is there any way to find out what Sales Orders can be dispatched?

Once you've received a Purchase Order you can check through 'Stock Avail' column of the Sales Order list page to see what can be dispatched.

Why are some products not showing in the Smart Buyer even though the stock is less than 'Min Stock Level'?

There are a few reasons why a product may not show up in the Smart Buyer.

The product has never been purchased within Cin7 Omni - the product must have at least been in one Purchase Order.
The combined stock in all the branches is higher than the minimum stock levels - The Smart Buyer looks at stock across all branches.
The product is the parent of a BOM product - you cannot use minimum stock levels for BOM products, you will have to create a production job, although you can use the 'Open Production Jobs - Materials Out of Stock' filter in the Smart Buyer to purchase production-job materials that are out of stock.