Using the Orders Module
Last updated November 6, 2025
The Orders tab provides a consolidated view of all replenishment orders – both planned and firm – and their status in the system. This module is closely linked to the Planning module: any changes you make to planned orders (My Supply) in Planning are reflected here as well. Think of the Orders page as your workflow for moving orders from planning stage to execution.
Order Definitions and Statuses: In Flowlity, an “order” is defined by a supplier and a delivery date, and each order can contain one or several products (order lines). The Orders module classifies orders by status:
- Purchase Requisitions (Planned): These are planned orders suggested by Flowlity or entered manually, which have not yet been confirmed by a planner. In the UI they often show as “Planned” status. Flowlity’s own recommendations fall in this category initially. They are recalculated every night – meaning if you haven’t confirmed them, the system might adjust them or delete them if the situation changes. Manual planned orders (ones you add) also sit here until confirmed. Essentially, these are provisional orders.
- Confirmed Purchase Requisitions: Once you, as a planner, validate a planned order, it becomes a confirmed requisition. This indicates that you agree with the order and intend to execute it (convert to an actual Purchase Order in your ERP). Confirmed PRs will not be deleted by Flowlity’s computation; they are fixed. These are the orders you would typically export or send to the supplier. In the UI these might be shown as “Validated” or similar.
- Purchase Orders: These are firm orders that have been officially released (often imported from your ERP once you create the PO). They represent actual commitments to suppliers. In Flowlity, POs are read-only in the sense that they came from the execution system – you monitor them here but don’t change their quantity or date through Flowlity (changes would be made in ERP and synced). POs have status “Ordered” or “Released” depending on terminology.
- Delivered: When an order has been fully received, it can be marked as delivered/closed. Delivered orders may still appear in history or until the delivery date passes, but they are essentially completed and no longer active in planning.
These statuses follow the typical workflow: Planned -> Confirmed -> (external PO) -> Delivered. On the Orders page, you can filter and view orders by these categories.
Navigation and Filters: The Orders module provides filtering tools to find specific orders:
- Filter by Status: At the top, there are quick filters (tabs or buttons) for Planned, Validated, Ordered, etc. Clicking “Planned” will show only purchase requisitions awaiting validation, “Validated” shows confirmed requisitions waiting to be sent, and so forth.
- Search Bar: You can search by product name, supplier name, or order ID in the search bar to quickly locate relevant orders.
- Filter by Supplier: A dropdown or filter option allows narrowing orders to a specific supplier’s orders. This is useful if you are reviewing everything you need to send to one supplier.
- Filter by Release Date: Options to filter orders that need to be sent out within certain time frames – e.g., this week, in 2 weeks, in 1 month, 2 months, or 3 months. This essentially filters by the planned order creation or release date (when the order should be placed).
- Filter by Delivery Date: Similarly, you can filter orders by their expected delivery dates – e.g., show me all orders arriving next month.
- Alerts Filter: The Orders page might also indicate which orders violate constraints (more below). Using the search or filters, you could find orders that are flagged for issues, like too early, too much, etc. (For example, searching “constraint” might list orders not meeting MOQs).
Checking Order Compliance: The Orders module helps ensure that each order adheres to the constraints and policies set. For each order (particularly planned ones), Flowlity checks:
- Product Constraints: e.g., if an order quantity for a product does not meet its MOQ or exceeds a lot-size increment, it might flag that the supply is not respecting the product’s constraints. For instance, if a product must be ordered in multiples of 50 and you have 30, it will note that discrepancy.
- Supplier Constraints: e.g., if the combined order doesn’t fill a Full Truck if required, or if you are ordering more frequently than the supplier’s allowed frequency. An alert “not respecting Full truck/Order frequency” would appear if, say, you generated an order two weeks in a row for a supplier who should be ordered monthly. Similarly, if you have a rule that a full pallet is X units and the order isn’t rounding up, it gets flagged.
- Component Shortage: If Flowlity also tracks components (for production orders), an order might be marked if it could cause a component shortage. (This is more relevant if Flowlity plans production and ensures raw materials are available. If a suggested production order has components not in stock, that could be noted as an issue.).
These compliance checks are visible as icons or warnings on each order line. Planners should review them before confirming orders. It’s often okay to confirm an order that slightly violates a constraint if you have a reason (e.g., you intentionally under-order a MOQ because you’re phasing out a product), but the system makes sure you do so consciously.
Order Details & Actions: Clicking on a specific order opens its detail view. Here you can see all order lines (products and quantities) under that order, the total order value or volume, and edit certain fields for planned orders. For planned orders, you can adjust the delivery date or split the order if needed. For example, if Flowlity grouped two products in one order but you want to separate them, you might split the order. You can also add a comment on an order line – Flowlity recently introduced the ability to leave notes explaining changes. These comments are saved and can be viewed later to recall why a quantity was overridden or an order was delayed (very useful for collaboration or audits).
When you are ready to execute orders, you will typically:
- Validate Planned Orders: Mark selected planned orders as confirmed (these become “Confirmed purchase requisitions”). This step is like saying “Yes, we will order this.” In Flowlity, this might be a bulk action – e.g., tick multiple planned orders and click Validate. Once validated, the orders won’t disappear each night, and they move to the next filter/status.
- Export or Send Orders: Depending on integration, you might export the confirmed orders to upload to your ERP or even have Flowlity interface directly. The Orders page allows a download of order data (CSV or PDF summary). If using Flowlity’s supplier collaboration (Network module), confirming might actually share the order with the supplier digitally (see Supplier Collaboration section).
- Mark as Sent/Ordered: After you have placed the PO with the supplier (outside Flowlity or via integration), you’d ensure they are reflected as actual Purchase Orders in Flowlity (usually by the next data integration from ERP). You could also manually mark them as “PO issued” in Flowlity if needed, which transitions them to Purchase Order status.
- Track Delivery: The Orders page will keep the orders until their due dates. You may update statuses if partial deliveries happen. Once delivered, they can be marked delivered (either via data integration when stock increases, or manually).
Throughout this process, the Orders module ensures traceability of what was planned versus what was executed, and keeps your planning and execution aligned. Because it’s linked to Planning, any change in demand or forecasts that affects future orders will generate new planned orders. It’s advisable to regularly review new suggestions, validate them, and purge or archive old plans.
In summary, the Order Management module is where suggested plans turn into real orders. Use it to filter and find urgent orders (the dashboard helps point to these), verify they meet constraints, then confirm and follow through so that your suppliers get the right signals and your inventory is replenished on time