Moving purchase orders from paper or spreadsheets into an electronic system produces several improvements, and one of them dwarfs the rest. Approval gets faster and numbering gets reliable, both of which are welcome. The change that matters most is that recording what arrived can happen at the delivery point, at the moment of delivery, by the person who saw it.
Receipts at the point of delivery
Deliveries are taken at loading bays and back doors by people who are not at desks. When the receipt can be recorded there and then, on a phone, against the order line, the match becomes possible immediately. Every day between delivery and receipt being recorded is a day an invoice cannot clear, and paper-based processes routinely lose a week here.
Numbering and approval, reliably
Numbers issued automatically from one source, never reused, and approval routed by value before the order is sent. Both are theoretically possible on paper and both fail in practice under time pressure. Making them automatic removes a class of problem that is invisible until an invoice cannot be matched months later.
The open-order report as a by-product
Once orders, approvals and receipts are all electronic, what is outstanding becomes a query rather than a reconstruction. Purchasing gets a chase list and finance gets an accrual, both from the same data, both without anybody rebuilding a spreadsheet at month end. That report is usually what makes the system pay for itself.
Questions people ask about electronic purchase order system
Do delivery staff need training?
Minimal if receipting is a few taps. If it needs more than that, it will not happen reliably, which is a product selection criterion rather than a training problem.
What about deliveries where there is no signal?
Look for offline capture that syncs later, and test it. Loading bays and basements are common dead spots.
Can suppliers see the orders?
Portals exist and are a later step. They change what suppliers must do, so they need a reason beyond your convenience.