Order Management
Customer orders get lost between messengers, calls and a notebook? It’s unclear what’s already shipped, what’s paid and what was forgotten. Sometimes goods that aren’t in stock get sold, because no one saw they were already reserved for another order. Every lost order is lost money and reputation.
Order management is the control of sales from a customer’s request to shipment and payment. ERPJS order management software tracks every order with a status, reserves goods and shows what’s done and what’s pending. Below — how it works.
What is order management and why do you need it?
Order management is the recording and handling of customer orders from the moment of request to full fulfilment. It answers the questions: which orders are in progress, what’s shipped, what’s paid and what’s overdue.
Without it, orders live in correspondence and in managers’ memory — hence forgotten requests, double sales of the same item and conflicts with clients. Systematic order management makes every deal manageable from start to finish.
How does order management work: from order to shipment?
In ERPJS an order goes through a logical chain, and every step is recorded:
- Order. A customer request is created with a list of goods, prices and delivery address. Goods can be reserved for the order right away.
- Shipment. When goods are shipped, a shipment document is created — stock decreases, the order moves on.
- Invoice and payment. An invoice is issued, payment is recorded. You see that the order is paid, and the client’s debt is calculated automatically.
Every order has a status, so at any moment you can see which stage it’s at — from a new request to a closed deal.
How do you reserve goods for an order?
Reservation is a key function of order management. When goods are reserved for an order, the system reduces the available quantity, so the same item isn’t sold twice. A manager sees not just how much is in stock, but how much is really free to sell.
This removes a typical trade problem: selling a client what was already promised to someone else. The order management is tied to inventory, so the reserved quantity is always taken into account.
How do you control order fulfilment?
Order management gives the manager and owner a full fulfilment picture:
- The status of every order — new, in progress, shipped, paid, closed.
- What’s shipped and what isn’t — you see orders waiting for shipment.
- Payments and debts — which orders are paid and which have a client debt.
For each order you can print a sales receipt or an invoice. So orders, stock and money stay one system, not separate tables.
Order management in ERPJS tracks every deal from request to payment: status, goods reservation, shipment, client debt. No order gets lost, and the same item isn’t sold twice.
Why is it better than managing orders in messengers and Excel?
When orders live in correspondence and tables, it’s easy to forget something, mix up quantities or sell reserved goods. There’s no link to stock and payments, so the real state of affairs has to be gathered by hand.
In software every order is linked to goods, stock and money. Reservation, shipment and payment are recorded automatically, and the status shows the real picture at any moment.
Who is it for?
Order management in ERPJS is useful for businesses working with customer orders:
- Wholesale and distribution
- Online stores
- Make-to-order manufacturing
- B2B sales with deferrals and prepayments
Orders for services and jobs
An order is not always goods from a warehouse. In service, installation or repair work it behaves the same way: there is a customer, something that has to be done, a deadline and a person responsible.
Such an order goes through its own stages — accepted, assigned to someone, given a deadline, marked as done, invoiced. For service work there is a separate type of order: with the item taken in, the fault described and repair statuses, so you have something to tell the customer when they ask where their item is.
Parts and materials used in the job are recorded in the same order, so the work and what it cost are visible side by side.
A deadline is not there for reporting: it immediately shows the orders where the date has passed and nothing has moved. Those are the ones that get lost.
A customer and their orders in one place
Orders are not a separate list — they belong to a customer. The customer card shows the whole history: what they ordered before, what is in progress now, what has been paid and how much is still owed.
This helps in two everyday situations. A customer calls asking where their order is — the answer is on the screen, with no digging through messages. And the other way round: before a new shipment you can see that an unpaid invoice is already outstanding, so the decision is a conscious one.
How the customer base itself works is described on the page customer database software.
Frequently asked questions
What is order management in simple terms?
It’s the handling of customer orders from request to shipment and payment. Order management shows what’s in progress, what’s shipped, what’s paid, and keeps orders from getting lost.
How does reserving goods for an order work?
When goods are reserved for an order, the system reduces the quantity available to sell. A manager sees how much is really free, so the same item isn’t sold twice.
How do you see the status of every order?
Every order has a status — new, in progress, shipped, paid, closed. At any moment you can see which stage an order is at and what’s left to do on it.
Are orders linked to stock and payments?
Yes. An order is linked to goods in stock (through reservation and shipment) and to payments (through an invoice). It’s a single system, not separate tables of orders, stock and money.
Can you print documents for an order?
Yes. For an order you can generate an invoice or a sales receipt with a ready list of items, prices and the total. Documents are printed or saved to a file.
Does order management work for service businesses?
Yes. An order for work is handled the same way as an order for goods: customer, list of work, deadline, person responsible and status. For service there is a separate type of order — with the item taken in, the fault described and repair stages.
How do I see what a customer ordered before?
The order history is kept in the customer card: past orders, current ones, payments and the outstanding balance. There is no need to search through correspondence or spreadsheets.