Vendor invoice workflow

  • 10 minutes

To verify and control the processing of vendor invoices and to facilitate the posting process, there are features in Accounts payable that are in place to provide users with the tools to manage this process:

  • vendor invoice totals must match the registered total before it can be submitted to workflow
  • a step in the Vendor invoice workflow to post the invoice once it passes workflow criteria

Prohibit submission to workflow when the invoice total and registered invoice total aren't equal

With this feature, if you have the Vendor invoice workflow activated, an invoice cannot be submitted to workflow if the registered quantity differs from the invoiced quantity. If that is the case, the person who is entering the invoice receives an error message that the invoice cannot be submitted to workflow.

Here is a video of how the process works:

Vendor invoice batch posting

To minimize delays between a vendor invoice being approved in workflow and the posting of that invoice, you can choose to have the invoice be added to a batch for posting in the workflow itself.

In the screenshot, you can see a Vendor invoice workflow with this task added:

Accounts payable > Setup > Accounts payable workflow

Screenshot of a vendor invoice workflow in Dynamics 365 Finance.

In this screenshot, you can see the workflow history and the posting process that has taken place.

Screenshot of the workflow history and posting process in Dynamics 365 Finance.

And then finally, after the batch posting, the invoice appears in the Open vendor invoices page:

Accounts payable > Invoices > Open vendor invoices

Screenshot of the Open invoices page with one row in Dynamics 365 Finance.

Update the invoice quantities to match product receipt quantities in workflow

Some business processes require that all goods and services are received from a vendor before an invoice can be created. To accomplish this, there is the option to turn on the Update the invoice quantities to match product receipt quantities in the workflow feature in the Feature management workspace.

This feature enables users the flexibility to update the invoice quantity within the workflow process, rather than receiving a workflow error. When an error is thrown, it requires the user to update the received quantity, then begin the invoice process over. This feature prevents posting errors and the user's wasted time and effort.

To learn more about the setup and configuration that is required for this feature, see Record vendor invoice and match against received quantity.