Using Buyer's Workbench

Purpose: The Buyer’s Workbench provides a central workspace for users with the ability to approve, dispatch, cancel, close, review, and update purchase orders. 

Audience: Purchasing staff

You must have at least one of these local college managed security roles:

  • ZZ Purchase Order Processing

You must also set these User Preference Definitions:

If you need assistance with the above security roles or User Preference Definitions, please contact your local college supervisor or IT Admin to request role access.

Using Buyer's Workbench

Navigation: Purchasing > Purchase Orders > Buyer’s Workbench

  1. The Buyer’s Workbench Search page displays.
  2. To add a new Run Control ID;
    1. Select the Add a New Value tab.
    2. Enter or look up your Business Unit.
    3. Create a name for the WorkBench ID.
    4. Select Add.
  3. Or to find an existing Run Control ID, click on search. Then select the designated Run Control ID.
  4. The Filter Options page will open.
Add a new value
  1. The Buyer’s Workbench Filter Options page displays.
  2. Use the available fields to customize your search if needed. Leave blank for all values:
    1. Search Criteria:
      • Purchase Order:  Enter PO number or PO number range
      • PO, Activity or Due Date:  Enter a date or date range.
      • Request BU: Input BU if searching by Requisition ID.
      • Requisition ID: Lookup or input a Requisition ID.
      • Item ID:  Enter Item ID to search by item.
      • Buyer: Select the buyer you want to filter the purchase orders by.
      • Card Number: Select the procurement card number you want to filter purchase orders by. You must select a buyer that has the rights to use procurement cards on a purchase order for card numbers to be available.
    2. Status:  Choose a status or leave blank for all values.  Check the Pending Appr (pending approved) check box to select purchase orders that are in a status of pending approved. You can cancel purchase orders that are in a pending approved status. Select the Include Closed check box to select purchase orders that are in a status of closed. The system clears this check box each time the page is accessed.
    3. Receiving: Use this section to define search criteria related to purchase order receipts, such as whether you want to retrieve purchase orders where receiving is required or optional for the purchase order.
    4. Matching: Use this section to define search criteria related to purchase order matching controls, such as whether matching is required or not required on the purchase order.
    5. Encumbrance: Select the Open Encumbrances check box to search for purchase orders with open encumbrances.
    6. ChartFields: You can enter multiple ChartField combinations as search criteria.
  3. Select Search and the system retrieves the selected information that matches the selection criteria and displays it on the Buyer's Workbench page.
Filter options
  1. The Buyer’s Workbench page will open.
  2. Add a Description.  

Use the View All option to expand the number of PO’s listed.  

Use the outer, vertical scroll bar if needed to see the entire screen.  

Select the Detail tab to review a specific PO number...

  • Click the Purchase Order number to access the purchase order inquiry screen and view additional PO details.
  • Click the Doc Status icon for the selected purchase order to access the purchase order Document Status to view related requisitions, receipts, vouchers, and payments.
  • Click the Lines button for the selected purchase order to access the Buyer's Workbench - Purchase Order Lines page. Using this page, you can view the lines associated with the purchase order or select individual lines to process the particular action for. You can cancel or close an individual line on a purchase order.
View Details

Select the Approval tab to review a specific PO number...

  • PO Status: The PO status will display and, for PO’s that are in Pending Approval or Approved status, the View Approval routing drop down is available.  The No. of Days Pending will show how many days the PO has been in pending approval status.
Approval tab page

Select the Other tab to review a specific PO number...

  • The Receipt Status, Backorder Status, Budget Status are available.
  • Click on the Go To PO Activity Summary button for the selected purchase order to access the Activity Summary inquiry page in a new window.
  • Click the Edit the PO? button to access the Maintain Purchase Orders screen in a new window to edit the purchase order.
Other tab page

The Action button availability is based on the user’s User Preferences-Purchase Order Authorization settings.

  • Approve:   Click this button to change the status of the selected purchase orders to Approved.
  • Unapprove:  Click this button to change the status of the selected purchase orders to Open. (Dispatched purchase orders cannot be unapproved).
  • Cancel:  Click to cancel the selected purchase orders. When you cancel a purchase order that is in a Dispatched status, the status changes to Pend Cncl (pending cancel).
  • Close:   Select to close the selected purchase orders from further processing.
  • Dispatch: Select to dispatch the selected purchase orders. Only purchase orders with approved or pending cancel statuses can be dispatched. The purchase order must also have a valid budget check status.
  • Preview:  Select to preview the selected purchase orders.
  • Budget Check:   Click to initiate the budget check process for the selected purchase orders. When you click the Budget Check button, the Processing Results page appears. Use this page to review the selected purchase orders and select to proceed with the budget check process.
  • Budget Pre-Check:  Click to check the budget only. This button enables you to check whether a budget exists for a purchase order before the amount is committed to the encumbrance and makes it possible to validate documents in work-in-progress mode without affecting budget balances. The statuses of Provisionally Valid or Error on the transaction pages indicate whether a budget is available.
Action buttons

The Go To hyperlink options at the bottom of the screen, provide access to the following:

  • Set filter options: Click to return to the Buyer's Workbench - Filter Options page to modify the search parameters.
  • Process Request Options: Click to access the Buyer's Workbench - Process Request Options page. Use this page to define process request options for use by the dispatch process.
  • Process Monitor:   Click to access the Process Monitor page, where you can view the status of purchase orders that you submitted to dispatch or preview.
  • View Processing Results: Click to access the Buyer's Workbench - Processing Results page, where you can view the results of the actions that you have performed.
  1. Select Save to save the search criteria that generated the list of purchase orders on the Buyer's Workbench page.
Go To navigation options
  1. Process complete.

Video Tutorial

The video below demonstrates the process actions described in the steps listed above. This video includes audio and closed captioning.  Select the play button to start the video.

Video Tutorial Via Panopto

View the external link to access the Customizing the Purchasing: WorkCenter & Workbenches training session. This link will open in a new tab/window.

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