Purchase returns
Send items back to a vendor with a debit note. Stock, what you owe and vendor credit stay right.
Return part of a purchase to the vendor, for example damaged, wrong or extra items. Each return makes a numbered debit note (DN-0001, DN-0002 and so on) that you can print or email to the vendor.
Return items
- Go to Purchases › Purchases and open the committed purchase.
- Click Return Items.
- Enter the Return Qty for each item you're sending back. You can return up to what you bought, less anything already returned.
- Check the Return Date, choose a Reason, and add Notes if you like.
- Click Save Debit Note.
What happens:
- Stock: the items come out of stock. For restaurants, raw materials come out of ingredient stock. The stock ledger shows them as Purchase Return.
- Tax: the tax on the returned items is reversed in the same share.
- Money: the return first comes off what you still owe on that purchase.
- Already paid: any part you'd already paid either comes back as a refund (choose how you received it, for example Cash) or stays as vendor credit. What happens is set in Billing settings under Stock & Purchases › Items Returned on a Paid Purchase. With Ask each time, you choose on each return.
Use vendor credit
- Go to Purchases › Vendors and click the vendor's balance due.
- The ledger shows Vendor credit available.
- Click Use credit next to a purchase and enter the amount.
The payment shows in Vendor Payments as Vendor Credit. Refunds you receive show there as Refund received.
Print, email or cancel a debit note
On the purchase, under Returns (debit notes):
- PDF: print or download the debit note.
- Email: sends the PDF to the vendor's email. If the vendor has no email, you're asked for one, and you can save it on the vendor.
- Cancel: puts the items back into stock and reverses the amounts. You can't cancel a debit note if its vendor credit has already been used.
All debit notes are listed under Purchases › Purchase Returns.
Tip
To cancel a whole purchase that has debit notes, cancel its debit notes first.
Reports
- The Purchases report shows Returned to Vendors and Net Purchases for the period.
- On Profit & Loss, products' average purchase cost leaves returned items out.