A sales order records an order from a customer, usually for internal purposes. Strictly speaking, it is not an accounting transaction and has no financial or inventory impact. It does not involve actual provision of services, movement of inventory, or payment of money. In fact, it is not really necessary at all, but can be used for a variety of purposes:

• Internal manufacturing or fulfillment planning
• Documentation of agreed pricing
• Customer communication
• Drafts of purchase or sales invoices

Enable Sales Orders tab and define customer

Before creating a sales order, enable the Sales Orders tab. Below the left navigation pane, click Customize, check the box for Sales Orders, and click Update:

Next, be sure the customer for whom the sales order is being entered has been defined in the Customers tab. Manager allows sales orders to be created in four different ways:

• Standard method
• Cloning
• Copying, using the Copy to function

Standard method

In the Sales Orders tab, select New Sales Order:

Complete the sales order form:

• Date is prefilled with today’s date, which may be edited.
• Reference is optional and may be used for internal or external sequences. If the box within the field is checked, Manager will number the transaction automatically. The program will search for the highest number among all existing sales orders and add 1.
• A Customer must be selected from the dropdown list.
• The Quote number field appears after a customer is selected, but only if the Sales Quote tab is enabled. If the sales order is being created manually, select from available sales quotes. If the sales order is being created by copying a sales quote, the quote number will be prefilled. The quote number is optional, but assists with status tracking.
• The customer’s Billing address fills automatically.
• An optional summary Description of the sales order can be entered.
• Line items can be entered semi-automatically by selecting inventory or non-inventory items in the Item field. Or they can be entered manually.
• Description of the line item is optional.
• Qty is where you enter the number of items being sold. One is assumed if nothing is entered.
• Unit price is the sales price per item.
• Tax codes can be selected as applicable.

Near the bottom of the screen are checkboxes for various options. Additional fields appear when some options are checked.

• A box can be checked to indicate Amounts are tax inclusive. If checked, the format of the data entry screen changes, omitting the Tax Amount and second Total columns.
• When the Discount box is checked, options appear for Percentage or Exact amount. This selection applies to the entire transaction, but discount entries must be made line item by line item.
• Track quantity to deliver is optional. It can help monitor status of sales order fulfillment. This field appears only if an inventory or non-inventory item is selected for a line item.
• A Custom theme can be selected if any theme besides the default is active.

Click Create when finished:

Cloning

Repeat sales orders can be entered by cloning previous ones. While viewing a similar sales order, click Clone. The new sales order need not be identical to the previous one. Anything can be edited or added:

The cloned sales order will have the same date as the source sales order. But, if automatic reference sequencing has been set up in Form Defaults in the Settings tab, a new reference number will be assigned.

Copying

To create a sales order from any sales- or purchase-related transaction, click the Copy to button while viewing the source transaction and select New Sales Order from the menu: