How do I link more than one bill to an open purchase order? Every time one is linked (even if for a smaller amount) the PO is closed automatically???

I appreciate you reaching out to us, CassidyScott.

I'll make sure that you can link those bills to your purchase order.

Once the Purchase Order status is Closed, we cannot attach another bill to it since the Copy to Bill option will disappear. To link the remaining bill successfully, you can manually change the status of the purchase order to Open. 

Here's how: 

1. Select Expenses from the sidebar menu.
2. Go to the Expenses tab.
3. Click the purchase order transaction to open it.
4. Below the Vendor drop-down menu, select Open from the drop-down.
5. Click Save, then Select Copy to Bill to link the remaining bill.

6. Enter the necessary information then select Save and close.

You can now start entering the bill payment.

Feel free to reach back out if you have any other concerns or follow-up questions. I'll be here to help in any way that I can.

Take care. 

The purchase order will not save as open.  It lets me select that option and save, but when I close out of the purchase order, it remains closed.  I am unable to reopen any PO and have it actually saved that way even though it appears to have this option.

Unfortunately the PO will not save as “Open”.  The system allows me to perform the open and save actions stated above, however when I exit the PO, it is still closed and not linked to any other invoice.  I don’t understand why I can’t open the PO, save, exit and the PO be Open? Please help as this is a problem with multiple PO’s in our system that are not tracking costs appropriately.

I appreciate the update that you gave, @CassidyScott.

Let me provide some clarifications on why you're unable to link a bill to a closed purchase order in QuickBooks Online.

The system allows you to use the purchase order for one transaction only. Once it has been copied to a bill, the status will be closed automatically and can't be linked to another entry.

To get your work done, you'll need to create another purchase order for the remaining bills that you have. This way, you can link them successfully.

I can see the benefit of being able to utilize a single purchase order to bills and vice versa to your business. Know that our developers are constantly considering new features to be added to the system to cope with our customer's needs.

I'd encourage you to visit our QuickBooks Online Blog site regularly to be updated with our recent news and product road-maps.

To add up, you can always scan through this reference, which talks about adding PO to expenses in QBO in case you'll need it on your future transactions: Learn how to add an accepted purchase order to a transaction for your vendor.

Please keep in touch with me here should you have any additional questions or concerns, I'm always around to talk QuickBooks.

So the answer is "NO" then.  You CANNOT link more than one invoice to a purchase order, even though the full amount of the purchase order has not been reached.  This is extremely disappointing as the PO feature is now obsolete for us and any other construction company that uses progress billing or makes deposits on any order.  The whole point of a purchase order is to approve costs for a certain amount to one vendor.  If I approve a cost that is being done in segments or needs a deposit, then the PO (which is not fulfilled at 100%) completely closes out in the system.  Now you are telling me that I need to go in and do another PO for the remaining amount of the first PO.  Again, this makes no sense, additional work for employees and kind of defeats the purpose of creating a purchase order to begin with.  Way to go QB Online, another example of launching a system with promises that simply DO NOT DELIVER!  Fail.  Highly disappointing.

I'm having the same problem - we created a PO, but the supplier shipped the order in three separate shipments. So now when I try to create the three bills, I can't do it. If I delete a single line item, the entire PO disappears.

We put a lot of work into creating the PO, so this is very frustrating. Also, the customer name is not copying over to the line items, which needs to be corrected. Please fix this system, it's practically useless the way it is!

Thank you for sharing your concern to use, @DynamiteBooks. 

I can share some details on how to manage purchase orders in QuickBooks Online.

When removing a specific line item, I suggest clicking the Trash bin icon beside the item you don't want to include on the bill. This will prevent deleting the entire Purchase Order.

Here's how:

1. Click on + New then select Bill.
2. On the Bill page, select the Vendor's name from the drop-down and fill out all information needed.
3. From the side, click on Add all.
4. Locate the line item you don't want to include on the bill.
5. Click on the Trash bin icon to remove it.
6. Select Remove line.
7. Once done, click on Save.

Feel free to read this to know more information on how you can manage purchase orders in QBO: Add purchase orders to expenses, bills, or checks in QuickBooks Online.

Leave a reply in the comment section if you need further help with this matter or QuickBooks. We're more than glad to assist. Have good one and take care!

I agree with you. I have the same problem and was looking at some software names like corecon. Were you able to find a solution?

Having the same issue here. This is a very standard process in almost any industry. It is very frustrating that you cannot have more than one invoice linked to a single PO.
I will have to look at other platforms now

You actually can.  Not sure why this hasn’t been explained anywhere on the internet. I spent all day trying to figure it out and did!

1.) if the PO already exists and the date is earlier than your bill. Follow the steps below:

a.) create bill

b.) choose supplier and cost category

c) a PO will appear on the right hand side for the tot amount.

d.) click it.

e.) the total amount of your po should appear in your bill.

f.) change the amount in the bill to the amount you want to pay off. Say the bill is $30,000 and you only want to pay $10,000. Change the $30,000 in your bill to $10,000.

g.) add any additional info in the notes and description ie. Deposit 

h.) go back to the po and on the right hand side it should show the amount that has been billed so far.

2.) If a bill it exists but you want to create a PO for it.

a.) create a PO for the supplier in question and cost category.

b.) make sure the PO’s creation date is before the bill date.

c.) go to the bill you want to attach to the po

D.) po should appear in the right hand side click it and it should drop into your bill. Now delete the old bill amount and replace the po amount you just entered with the old bill amount

i believe this answers your question?

Let me know if this helps… or perhaps you’ve moved on haha.

I figured it out.

Wouldn't this mean that we'd manually have to add the lines back in the next time we send a shipment on the same PO?

Hey there, @angelaterese13. 

Thanks for joining in on this thread. 

Yes, you'll need to manually add the lines back the next time you send a shipment on the same PO. 

Come back if you have any other questions or concerns. We're always here to lend a helping hand. Have a splendid day and weekend ahead!