A PO flip is the conversion of an existing purchase order into the supplier invoice, so the invoice reuses the order data instead of being keyed in again.
A PO flip is the practice of generating an invoice directly from a purchase order that already exists, rather than creating the invoice from scratch. In classic e-procurement the supplier does the flipping: the buyer's order arrives on a network or supplier portal, the supplier confirms what was shipped and presses one action, and the system produces an invoice that carries the order number, the line identifiers, the agreed prices and the tax codes. The term also covers the buyer side version, where the buying company builds its purchase invoice from its own order and receipt lines instead of retyping the supplier's PDF.
The point of a flip is that the invoice inherits data that was already agreed, so the two documents cannot disagree by accident. Rekeyed invoices introduce transposed amounts, wrong vendor numbers, missing order references and unit of measure mistakes, and each of those becomes an exception that a human has to research, often by emailing the supplier and waiting a day or two. A flipped invoice arrives already referencing the order, so matching becomes a check rather than an investigation, and only genuine differences such as a short delivery or a price change need attention.
Business Central does not host a supplier portal where your vendors log in and flip your orders, so the supplier side flip requires a network, a portal or an e-invoicing channel. What BC provides natively is the buyer side equivalent and it is solid: post the order as Receive, then create a purchase invoice and use Get Receipt Lines to pull in the posted receipt lines with their quantities, prices and order link, or simply post the order as Receive and Invoice when the invoice matches in full. Copy Document does the same job from the order itself. In parallel, the E-Documents framework can receive structured supplier invoices, for example over Peppol, which removes the retyping without needing the supplier to work in your system. Zentriq Document Capture sits in the same slot for suppliers who only send PDFs: it reads the document, drafts the purchase invoice against the order lines, and leaves posting to a human approver. Which route fits which supplier is the subject of the dedicated invoice matching guide.
Purchase order PO-2291 is placed with Nordluft AG for 200 filter cartridges at CHF 12.50, total CHF 2,500, terms 30 days net. Only 180 cartridges ship. The receipt is posted for 180 units, CHF 2,250. When the invoice is built from the receipt lines, it comes out at exactly CHF 2,250 and matches without discussion, and the remaining 20 units stay open on the order. Had the CHF 2,500 invoice been keyed in from the supplier PDF instead, the CHF 250 difference would have surfaced as an exception days later, after someone had already approved the header amount.
The usual complications are partial deliveries, freight and duty added on the invoice but absent from the order, and price changes the supplier applied without amending the order. None of these are flip failures as such, they are real commercial differences that a flip surfaces immediately instead of hiding. Teams watch the share of invoices created from an order or receipt rather than typed manually, and the number of order lines still open with a quantity received but not invoiced, which is the queue a flip is supposed to keep short.
No, it removes the need for rekeying. The invoice still has to be checked against what was actually received and against the agreed price, because a supplier can flip an order for goods that never arrived or at a price that was changed unilaterally.
Not in standard BC, which has no vendor facing portal. The supplier needs an e-invoicing channel such as Peppol, an external network, or you build the invoice on your side from the order and receipt lines.
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