Managing the Budget

Setting Up Budget Categories

1. Click Budget in the sidebar menu.
2. You will see your budget dashboard organized by school year and category.
3. Set the allocated amount for each category.

The budget tracks three amounts:

• Allocated -- the total budget assigned
• Spent -- money already used (from received purchase orders)
• Encumbered -- money committed to approved purchase orders but not yet spent
• Available = Allocated - Spent - Encumbered

Creating Purchase Orders

1. Click Purchase Orders in the sidebar menu.
2. Click Create PO.
3. Select a vendor (book supplier) from the list.
4. Add the books you want to order:
   • Title (required)
   • ISBN (optional)
   • Quantity (how many copies)
   • Unit price (cost per copy)
5. Click Add Line Item to add more books.
6. Add any notes.
7. Click Create.

What you'll see: The purchase order is created as a "Draft" with an auto-generated PO number (like "PO-2026-0042").

Purchase order steps:

1. Draft -- You can still edit the PO. Click Submit when ready.
2. Submitted -- Sent for approval. Click Approve to approve it.
3. Approved -- The budget amount is now reserved (encumbered). When the books arrive, click Receive.
4. Received -- The books are automatically added to your catalog with new accession numbers. The budget changes from encumbered to spent.

You can cancel a purchase order at any stage. If it was already approved, the encumbered budget is released back to available.

You can also download a PDF of the purchase order to send to the vendor.

Tracking Spending

Use the Budget Dashboard to see how much of your budget has been used. The dashboard shows allocated, spent, encumbered, and available amounts for each category and school year.

Working with Vendors

1. Click Vendors in the sidebar menu.
2. Add your book suppliers with their contact information:
   • Name
   • Contact person
   • Email, phone, address
   • Payment terms
3. Vendors appear in the dropdown when you create purchase orders.

If something goes wrong (budget):

• "Insufficient budget" when approving a PO -- Your available budget is not enough. Check the Budget Dashboard. You may need to cancel other approved POs, increase your allocated budget, or split the PO into smaller orders.