Glossary
What is a past-due purchase order? Definition and examples
Past-due purchase order: A past-due purchase order is an open order line whose promised date has passed without a full receipt.
By Roufaida Bouchamha, founder
The definition
An open purchase order line is past due when its promised date (or, if the supplier never confirmed, the date you requested) is earlier than today and the full quantity has not been received. Partly received lines are past due for the remaining quantity.
Why the past-due report is hard to use
Most ERPs can list past-due lines, grouped by supplier or sorted by days late. On a normal Monday a mid-market plant can have dozens or hundreds of them. Sorting by days late feels logical, but it answers who is late, not which late order will stop production. An order three weeks late for a part with two months of stock is a supplier performance topic. An order two days late for a part that runs out Thursday is an emergency.
How to find the past-due orders that matter
- List open lines whose promised date is before today, with item, supplier, quantity and dates.
- Add stock and usage for each item and compute days of cover.
- Compare cover with the date the order will really arrive, and check whether another open order for the same item arrives earlier.
- Keep the lines where cover runs out first: these are shortage risks.
- Sort them by cover, shortest first: that is your chase list.
Illustrative example, not a customer result
Order A is 12 days late; its part has 60 days of cover and another delivery next week. Order B is 2 days late, never confirmed; its part has 3 days of cover and no other order. Sorted by days late, A comes first. Sorted by cover, B does, and B is the one to call about today.
Common data problems
- Promised dates not maintained: the line still shows the original date after the supplier gave a new one.
- Receipts booked late: goods on the dock but not received in the ERP make lines look past due.
- Undated lines: orders with no confirmed date are invisible in a past-due report but can be the riskiest.
Step-by-step guides by ERP
The method is the same everywhere; the screens differ. See the guides for SAP, Dynamics 365, Oracle Fusion, Odoo, NetSuite and Epicor.
How WERISCO uses it
WERISCO reads your stock, usage and open purchase orders together and tells you which late or undated supplier orders will leave a part short before they arrive, ranked by severity, with each part's days of cover shown as evidence. Your team decides what to chase; nothing is written back to your ERP and nothing is sent to suppliers.
Questions people ask
- Is a partly received order past due?
- Yes, for the quantity still open. Treat the remaining quantity as its own line when you compare it with stock cover.
- Which date should I use, requested or promised?
- Use the supplier's latest promised date when there is one, and your requested date otherwise. Flag lines that were never confirmed: their date is your wish, not the supplier's commitment.
- Should I chase every past-due order?
- No. Chase the ones that leave a part short before they arrive. Review the others with the supplier in your regular performance review.
