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Small and medium business | Business Central, N...
Suggested Answer

Construction Purchase Order / Invoicing

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Posted on by 66

Hello—

I am having a hard time finding a good job set up for our construction division. 

Once we have our numbers for “service work” (not physical qty items), we create a job. 

In a job card, In the job planning lines, the system forced me to put a “qty”. Following cost. 

Let’s say my job planning line is $100 for a painting service. I put in $100 and enter a qty of 1. 

at that time I can create a po for the vendor. 

now the vendor sends me an invoice that’s for partial work.

(we invoice from the po)

Now I need to invoice the po so we can pay the vendor.

But when I go into the po to adjust the direct cost and then invoice, the po closes out because I had to receive and invoice that qty of 1. 

What am I doing wrong? How can I keep the PO open so accounts payable can invoice the remaining amounts when those invoices come in? 

this service work we’re generating pos for does do not have “units of measure”.

we tried receiving the qty by % and that turned out to be a nightmare.

overall, we have service work that totals an amount and the qty part of BC is causing me problems. 

thank you! 

I have the same question (0)
  • Suggested answer
    Nitin Verma Profile Picture
    21,794 Moderator on at

    Hi,

    During Receive and Invoice PO, PO deleted automatically and send those information after posting to the Posted Purchase Receipts and Posted Purchase Invoice with ref. of the PO, if PO Qty is equal to Qty. to Invoice field.

    Now in your case I think you only want to Invoice and payment without closing the PO, so you can go with the Prepayment invoices so that It allows you to do the partially invoices but not closing the PO, and do the payment posting accordingly.

    Please refer the below link for Prepayment Invoicing functionality.

    docs.microsoft.com/.../finance-invoice-prepayments

    docs.microsoft.com/.../finance-how-to-create-prepayment-invoices

  • Suggested answer
    YUN ZHU Profile Picture
    99,055 Super User 2026 Season 1 on at

    Hi, Is it possible to use the Copy Document feature to create multiple POs?
    For example, at the beginning of $100, you change it to $30 and post it. The second time you use Copy Document to copy the original order or Posted Purchase invoice, change the amount to $20, and post it again.
    But number management will be a bit more complicated.

    pastedimage1662701273107v2.png

    Or you can post with decimals.

    pastedimage1662701667382v3.png

    pastedimage1662701740473v4.png

    Hope this helps.

    Thanks.

    ZHU

  • Suggested answer
    Assisted by AI
    CU27011421-0 Profile Picture
    86 on at

    You’re running into this because Business Central is still treating your service line as a quantity-based transaction, even though your scenario is really amount-based.

    When you set qty = 1 and fully receive/invoice it, BC considers the PO complete. That’s why it closes and doesn’t allow partial invoicing properly.

    For service-type work like this, a better approach is:

     
    • Don’t use qty = 1 for the full amount

    • Instead, split the line into a higher quantity (or use partial amounts) so you can receive/invoice in parts

    • Alternatively, use “Receive partial + invoice partial” without fully receiving the line at once



    •  

    Another common approach in construction scenarios is:


    • Use multiple lines or staged POs based on milestones

    • Or manage it via job planning lines with multiple entries, instead of one lump sum


    •  

    The key idea is. BC needs something to “track against” (qty or amount). If you consume it fully in one go, the PO lifecycle ends.

     

    So for partial invoicing, you need to structure the PO in a way that allows incremental consumption, not a single unit.

  • Suggested answer
    Teagen Boll Profile Picture
    1,409 Super User 2026 Season 1 on at
    The other answers in this thread are correct. Business Central uses 3 way matching based off the quantity field so there isnt much you can do to avoid having POs close if the quantity is 1.
     
    There are a few options I would recommend from my experience.
     
    1. Set quantity as the dollar amount for the PO and then the cost as 1$ and only receive and invoice for the work done. This is easy to manage and quick.
    2. Use Blanket POs instead and create POs based off work completed. You would need to potentially create multiple lines.
  • Suggested answer
    Valentin Castravet Profile Picture
    32,157 Super User 2026 Season 1 on at
    Do you know before hand that the vendor will send you an invoice for partial work? If you do then I'd create multiple project planning lines, one for each invoice. This way each invoice can have a qty. of 1.
     

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