Creating Purchase Contracts

  • 01/04/2023
  • 12 minutes to read

Like Continia Expense Management and most other Continia solutions and modules, the Purchase Contracts module is integrated directly into Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, where you can access it using the Search icon when you want to create purchase contracts, as described below.

Overall, you can create purchase contracts in the following two ways:

Which of these methods to use depends entirely on your personal preference and what page you're navigating from in any given context. Both methods are described in detail below.

To create a purchase contract from scratch

If you want to create a purchase contract from scratch without basing it on an existing expense, follow these steps:

  1. Choose the Search icon, enter Purchase Contracts, and then choose the related link to open the Purchase Contracts page.

    Note

    You can also open this page from the Business Central Role Center: Under Purchase Contracts, select the All Cue to open it. Note that the page is called All when you access it this way, but in all other respects it's identical with the Purchase Contracts page.

  2. In the action bar, select New to open the Purchase Contract page.

  3. On the General FastTab, fill in the fields as needed. Some of the fields deserve special mention here, as they're particularly important to fill in and understand:


    FieldDescription
    TypeIn this field, you must choose Expense. This field is only displayed if you run both Document Capture and Expense Management.
    Purchaser Code (Reviewer)In this field, you must enter or select the code of the person you want to review the contract that you're setting up.
    Price TypeThis field allows you to specify if the amounts of the contract lines must exactly match the amounts of related expenses in order for the expenses to be approved automatically (Fixed Amount), or if a certain amount variance is acceptable (Variable Amount).

    If you select Variable Amount, Expense Management will use the values entered under Max. Allowed Line Variance % for the relevant lines (on the Lines FastTab) to determine if the related expense amount is within the allowed variance. If you select Fixed Amount, Expense Management will disregard any values entered under Max. Allowed Line Variance %.
    Invoicing Period CodeUse this field to specify how often you expect expenses relating to this contract to be sent by the employees. Your selection is used for calculating the Yearly Amount for each line on the Lines FastTab, together with the Quantity and Unit Cost fields.

    Note

    You can create your own period codes. To do this, select the field to open the drop-down menu, and then select + New. On the page that opens, fill in the fields as required. Under Period Date Formula, your entry must be an integer followed by D (days), WD (weekdays), W (weeks), M (months), Q (quarters), or Y (years) – for example, 2W (two weeks).

    On the same page, you can also specify how often the contract must be reviewed, by editing the Review field. If you select Date Formula here, enter the formula under Review Date Formula, using the guidelines mentioned above. Whatever you enter in these two fields will be autofilled in the corresponding fields on the Review FastTab (see step 4 below).

    Auto Approve Within VarianceIn this field, select Yes if you want Expense Management to automatically approve expenses, provided that the expense amount matches the corresponding contract line amount within the variance defined under Max. Allowed Line Variance % on the Lines FastTab.

    The following rules apply, depending on whether you select Yes or No:
    • Yes: If you've selected Fixed Amount under Price Type and/or entered no value under Max. Allowed Line Variance %, the expense amount must match the contract line amount exactly in order for the expense to be automatically approved.
    • No: If you've selected Variable Amount under Price Type and/or entered a value under Max. Allowed Line Variance %, these settings will be disregarded entirely.

  4. On the Review FastTab, fill in the fields as needed:


    FieldDescription
    ReviewUse this field to specify how often the contract must be reviewed. The default option is Yearly, unless you've edited this in the Invoicing Period Code field in step 3 above – any changes you make to the Review and Review Date Formula fields under Invoicing Period Code will be autofilled here.

    Note

    If you select Date Formula, the Review Date Formula field appears. Here, you must enter a formula in the form of an integer followed by D (days), WD (weekdays), W (weeks), M (months), Q (quarters), or Y (years) – for example, 2W (two weeks). For more advanced formulas, you can also use the mathematical symbols + and –, or you can enter the letter C (current) as a prefix to any of the previously mentioned time units – for example, CM+10D (current month plus ten days).

    Next Review DateIn this field, you can specify when the contract should be reviewed next. The default value depends on what you selected above under Review. For example, if you selected Yearly, the default value will be the contract start date plus a year, minus one month.

  5. On the Lines FastTab, create a line for each employee that you expect to receive an expense, by filling in all fields as needed. The following fields deserve special mention:


    FieldDescription
    Expense userIn this field, select the expense user that you want to be associated with this line.
    Unit CostWhen you fill in this field, the Amount Excl. VAT and Yearly Amount fields (which are both uneditable) will be autofilled based on what you entered. Likewise, the two fields will be autofilled if you edit the Quantity field. The value of the Yearly Amount field is also based on your selection in the Invoicing Period Code field on the General FastTab.
    Max. Allowed Line Variance %If you enter a percentage here, the expense amount will be be automatically approved if it matches the contract line amount within the entered variance percentage.

    Important

    This only applies if the following two settings have been set on the General FastTab: Price Type must be set to Variable Amount, and Auto Approve Within Variance must be set to Yes.

To create a purchase contract from an expense

To create a purchase contract from an expense, follow these steps:

  1. Choose the Search icon, enter Expenses, and then choose the related link.

  2. In the list of expenses, select the expense that you want to use as a basis for your purchase contract.

  3. Select Edit.

  4. In the action bar, select Actions -> Purchase Contract > Create Purchase Contract to open the Edit - Create Purchase Contract page.

    Note

    The following fields on the page will be autofilled, mostly with data from the header of the selected expense:

    • Description will be autofilled with the Description value from the expense.
    • Purchaser Code (Reviewer) will be autofilled with the Salesperson/Purchaser value from Expense Approver ID found on the Continia User Setup page. ***
    • Review will be autofilled with the default option Yearly.
    • Vendor No. will be autofilled with the Vendor No. from the expense.

  5. If necessary, edit the autofilled fields, and fill in the remaining fields as required.

  6. Select OK to close the page and create the contract.

This will open the contract on the Purchase Contracts page, where you can make any necessary changes and fill in additional fields. For a description of this process, see steps 3-5 in the guide above.

To add an expense to an existing contract

You also have the option of adding an expense to an existing purchase contract. Follow these steps to do that:

  1. Choose the Search icon, enter Expenses, and then choose the related link.
  2. In the list of expenses, select the expense that you want to use as a basis for your purchase contract.
  3. Select Edit.
  4. in the Purchase Contracts FastTab, in Purchase Contract No., select the contract to which you want to add the expense.
  5. in the Purchase Contracts FastTab, in Purchase Contract Line No., select the three dots to see a dialogue asking whether you want to create a new contract line based on this expense or not. If you choose Yes, then a contract line will be created.

    Note

    If the contract already has a line for this employee, a list of contract lines filtered by this employee number will be displayed for you to choose from.

See also

Purchase Contract Reviews
Approving Expenses Based on a Contract
Viewing the Purchase Contract Archive