Purchase order statuses

What each purchase order status means and which actions are available in it.

Every purchase order sits in exactly one status. The status controls what you can do next and whether the order can still be edited.

The statuses

Status	Meaning	What you can do
Draft	Being prepared. Line items are still editable.	Send, or cancel.
Sent	Issued to the vendor.	Confirm, hold, or cancel.
Confirmed	Acknowledged by the vendor.	Receive (in the warehouse), hold, or cancel.
Partially received	Some, but not all, lines have been received.	Receive the rest, hold, or cancel.
Received	Fully received.	Close.
On hold	Paused.	Resume (to Sent, Confirmed, or Partially received), or cancel.
Closed	Finalized. Read-only.	None.
Cancelled	Withdrawn.	None.

How they connect

The following diagram shows how a purchase order moves between statuses:

Purchase order status flow: Draft to Sent to Confirmed to Partially received (looping while lines arrive) to Received to Closed, with hold, resume, and cancel branches

A purchase order can only be sent once it has at least one line item.
Receiving against the PO happens in the warehouse; it moves the order to Partially received as lines arrive and to Received once everything is in.
Hold pauses a Sent, Confirmed, or Partially received order; Resume returns it to where it was.

Editing rules

Line items can be added, changed, removed, and reordered only while the PO is in Draft.
A purchase order can be deleted while it is in Draft or Cancelled.

Where to go next

For the steps, see Create a purchase order.
For receiving, see Receive a purchase order.