It is easy to evaluate a purchase order management system on how pleasant it is to raise an order, which is the activity you see in a demonstration and a small part of the work. A better test is what it can tell you afterwards, because the reports are where the time is saved. Two of them justify the whole thing, and both depend on receipts being recorded at line level.
Open orders by age
Everything ordered and not yet fully received, sorted by how long it has been outstanding. Purchasing uses it to chase, operations uses it to plan, and finance uses it to understand commitments. Teams without it discover late deliveries when somebody complains, which is both slower and more expensive than a weekly glance at a list.
Received but not invoiced
Goods that arrived and have not yet been billed. This is your accrual at period end, and rebuilding it by hand each month is one of the most common hidden costs of not having a system. It is also a useful early warning: a supplier who has delivered and not invoiced will eventually invoice, often at the least convenient moment.
Why both depend on the goods receipt
Neither report exists unless somebody records what arrived, when it arrived, against which line. That step is usually performed by people outside finance and is the one most often skipped. Any system implementation that does not make the receipt easy for whoever signs for deliveries will produce two empty reports and a disappointed finance team.
Questions people ask about purchase order management system
Who should record goods receipts?
Whoever physically receives the delivery, at the time. Batching them into finance later is where accuracy is lost and where the delay comes from.
What if we do not hold stock?
You still receipt: for services and non-stock items the receipt is a confirmation that the work or goods were delivered, and it plays the same role in matching.
How often should we review open orders?
Weekly is enough for most organisations, with a longer look at anything past a threshold age at month end.