Linking purchase orders, delivery notes and invoices in SamBooks
9 min read
How SamBooks keeps a purchase order, its delivery note and its invoice linked together, what “To confirm” or “Mismatch” mean, and how to turn on the automatic 3-way match before posting.
What this is for
A purchase in SamBooks often moves through three documents in sequence: the purchase order (what you committed to), the purchase delivery note (what actually arrived) and the supplier invoice (what you are being charged). SamBooks tracks the links between these three documents in both directions — you can link them from the order, from the delivery note or from the invoice, wherever you happen to be — and, if you turn it on, it uses those links for an automatic check of quantity and price mismatches between what was ordered, received and invoiced (the 3-way match: order ↔ delivery note ↔ invoice) before letting you post the invoice to the journal.
This guide brings together every place where you can link or unlink these documents, and walks through the 3-way match control step by step, since it does not have a guide of its own yet. To create the individual documents, see Create and manage a purchase order, Receive goods and register the purchase delivery note and Recording a supplier invoice.
Before you start
- You need the Manager, Administrative or Logistics role to link or unlink documents; a Viewer can see the links but cannot change them.
- Turning the 3-way match on or off, however, is reserved to the Manager role only: Administrative users cannot even see this settings page, even though they can do almost everything else in the purchase cycle.
- A link between two documents only works if they share the same supplier.
- You can link or unlink an order or a delivery note to a supplier invoice only before or during posting: once an invoice is Posted, the only way to change its links is to send it back to draft with Back to draft, update the links, and post it again.
- If your company is on the flat-rate scheme (RF19), the whole purchase cycle — and so these links too — is unavailable.
Step by step
1. Link delivery notes and invoices directly from the purchase order
Open an order and go to the Chain tab. At the top you will find the Linked documents card, with two searchable columns:
- Purchase delivery notes — search for a delivery note from the same supplier (even one that was not generated from this order) and press Link selected to attach it; an already linked one shows Unlink delivery note.
- Supplier invoices — the same mechanism, with Link selected/Unlink invoice.
This card is different from the automatic chain you see further down (the one that comes from pressing Register delivery note on the order): here you manually link a delivery note or invoice that already exists but is not attached to this order yet — useful if you created the delivery note somewhere else (for example from the wizard on the delivery notes page) or if an invoice references the order without going through a delivery note. You can do this as long as the order is not cancelled; if you try on an order in a state that does not allow it, you will see “Linking not available in this state.” On success the message is “Document linked.” (or “Document unlinked.”); if something goes wrong you will see “Operation failed” with the error detail.
2. Link orders and the invoice from the purchase delivery note
Open a delivery note's detail page and you will find the same Linked documents card, this time with an Orders column (many-to-many — one delivery note can cover several orders from the same supplier, button Link purchase orders) and an Invoice column (one-to-one — a delivery note links to a single invoice, button Link to supplier invoice). Linking the invoice also triggers the 3-way match evaluation, if it is on (“Invoice linked: 3-way match evaluated.”). The full detail of this card — including when a delivery note becomes “Invoiced” — is in Receive goods and register the purchase delivery note.
3. Link delivery notes and orders from the supplier invoice
Open a supplier invoice's detail page, Accounting tab, Recognised references card. If the supplier quoted an order or delivery note number on the invoice (the FatturaPA “order data”/“delivery note data” fields), SamBooks already lists them; press Resolve automatically to have them linked where possible (“{n} references linked automatically.”, or “No automatic link: confirm manually.” if none is unambiguous). Alternatively, or in addition, use Link delivery notes/orders: a dialog opens with two separate lists — delivery notes and orders from the same supplier — tick the right ones and press Link. Linking a delivery note to the invoice also inherits any orders already linked to that delivery note. The full detail of this card — and the invoice's other actions — is in Recording a supplier invoice.
4. Read the status of a recognised reference
In the Recognised references card, every reference has one of four statuses:
- Not found — the supplier quotes a number SamBooks cannot find among that supplier's orders/delivery notes (different numbering, document not entered yet).
- To confirm — one matching candidate: SamBooks proposes it, and you confirm the link manually (or with Resolve automatically if the 3-way match is on).
- Ambiguous — more than one possible candidate: it must always be chosen by hand, never resolved automatically.
- Linked — the link has already been made.
5. Turn on the 3-way match
Manager role only: open Settings → Company settings → Purchase control. The page is titled Purchase control (3-way match), described as “Compares order ↔ purchase delivery note ↔ supplier invoice on quantity and price. When on, an invoice with a mismatch beyond tolerance must be approved before it can be posted to the journal.” Turn on the Enable 3-way match switch (off by default — “Off by default: if you do not use the delivery-note purchase cycle, this never gets in your way.”); two fields unlock:
- Quantity tolerance (%)
- Price tolerance (%)
described as “0 = exact match required. Within tolerance, the invoice is approved automatically.” Press Save (while saving the button reads “Saving…”): on success you will see “Configuration saved.”, otherwise “Save failed.”
6. Read and, if needed, approve the 3-way match on an invoice
When the control is on, a supplier invoice with at least one linked order or delivery note shows the 3-way match (order ↔ delivery note ↔ invoice) panel, comparing these figures — Ordered qty., Received qty., Invoiced qty., Order value, Invoice taxable amount — with a summary badge:
- Matched — “Quantities and amounts match the order: the invoice is approved and ready to post.” No action needed.
- Mismatch — “Quantities or amounts differ from the order: review and approve before posting the invoice to the journal.”, with an Approve button. Until you press Approve, Confirm and post stays blocked for this reason alone — not because of a missing account or anything else.
The panel does not show at all if the control is off, or if the invoice has no linked reference yet.
What happens when you link the documents
- On the order: linking a delivery note or an invoice here is tracking only — it does not move the order's status by itself (partially/fully fulfilled only advances when you issue a delivery note generated from the order, not when you manually link an external one).
- On the delivery note: once its lines are fully covered by the linked invoice, its status moves from To invoice to Invoiced; with partial coverage it stays “To invoice”.
- On the invoice: if the 3-way match is on, linking the order/delivery note is what lets the panel compute a mismatch — with nothing linked, the panel has nothing to compare against.
- None of these links post a journal entry by itself: that only happens when the invoice is posted (or when a customs bill is registered, for import VAT).
Who can do what
Linking and unlinking documents — from the order, the delivery note or the invoice, including approving a mismatch in the 3-way panel — is allowed for Manager, Administrative and Logistics users. It is one of the few actions on a supplier invoice that a Logistics user can perform: creating, editing or posting the invoice itself stays reserved to Manager and Administrative. Turning the 3-way match configuration on or changing it, though, is Manager only.
Ask Sam
Everything above can also be done by asking Sam in chat, with the same result as the form — the two paths are equivalent:
- “Resolve the references on supplier invoice 128 automatically.”
- “Link order 12 and delivery note 7 to supplier invoice 128.”
- “Unlink order 9 from delivery note 14.”
- “Turn on the 3-way match with 5% tolerance on quantity and price.”
- “Show me the 3-way match on supplier invoice 128” and, if there is a mismatch, “approve the 3-way match on supplier invoice 128.”
If something goes wrong
- “Linking not available in this state.”: the order is cancelled, or the document you are trying to link is in a state that does not allow it (for example an already cancelled delivery note).
- You cannot find an order or delivery note in the search: check it belongs to the same supplier as the invoice or document you are linking from — linking across different suppliers is not allowed.
- You can no longer link/unlink something on an invoice: if it is already Posted, send it back to draft first with Back to draft (disabled with a warning if it has already generated a reverse-charge self-invoice).
- “Confirm and post” stays blocked even though every line has an account: check the 3-way match panel — if the status is Mismatch, you need to press Approve first.
- A Logistics user cannot create or post the invoice: that is expected, not a bug — Logistics can link/unlink documents and approve the 3-way match, but creating and posting the invoice stays reserved to Manager and Administrative.
Frequently asked questions
How do I link a purchase order to an invoice without going through a delivery note? From the invoice, Accounting tab → Recognised references → Link delivery notes/orders, or from the order itself, Chain tab → Linked documents card → Supplier invoices column.
What is the 3-way match and should I turn it on? It compares quantities and amounts across the order, delivery note and invoice, and forces you to explicitly approve any mismatch before posting. It is off by default: turn it on only if you regularly work with orders and delivery notes and want an automatic check on mismatches.
Why is an invoice still blocked even though I have assigned every account? If the 3-way match is on and the invoice has an unapproved mismatch, that is the block: open the 3-way match panel and press Approve.
Can I unlink an order from an already posted invoice? Not directly: send the invoice back to draft with Back to draft first, then link/unlink, then post again.
Who can turn on the 3-way match? Only the Manager role: the settings page is not visible to Administrative users.
Does a linked delivery note automatically become “Invoiced”? Only if the invoice covers all of its lines. If it only covers part of them, the delivery note stays “To invoice”.
Can a Logistics user post a supplier invoice? No: they can link/unlink documents and approve the 3-way match, but creating and posting the invoice remain reserved to Manager and Administrative.