Purchase Order Processing

Time to complete	20 minutes
Difficulty	Intermediate
Prerequisites	Procurement system access, Email or Slack connection
You'll build	An assignment that auto-approves POs based on thresholds and routes high-value orders for review

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Why Automate This?

The Problem: Purchase order approvals create bottlenecks. Simple $500 orders wait in the same queue as $50,000 purchases. Managers waste time approving routine orders while critical purchases get delayed. Meanwhile, procurement teams manually check vendor status and budget availability for every single PO.

The Solution: A Duvo assignment that intelligently processes purchase orders based on configurable thresholds—auto-approving routine orders instantly while routing high-value purchases through appropriate approval chains.

Expected Results:

• Auto-approve 70-80% of routine POs instantly

• Reduce approval cycle from 2-3 days to under 4 hours

• Eliminate manual vendor validation checks

• Ensure budget compliance before approval

• Complete audit trail for compliance

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What You'll Build

By the end of this tutorial, you'll have an assignment that:

1. Monitors your procurement system for new purchase orders

2. Validates vendor status against your approved vendor list

3. Checks available budget before processing

4. Auto-approves orders under your threshold limits

5. Routes high-value orders to appropriate approvers

6. Sends confirmations and updates status automatically

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Before You Start

Make sure you have these ready:

• Procurement system - You'll need logins with read/write access. Set up logins

• Email or Slack connection - For notifications and approvals. Connect connection

• Budget system access (optional) - For automatic budget validation

• Approved vendor list - Either in your procurement system or as a Files file

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Step 1: Create Your Assignment

1. Click "+ Create Assignment" from your dashboard

2. Select "Use Assignment Builder" (recommended for this tutorial)

Create Assignment Button

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Step 2: Describe Your Workflow

Paste this prompt into the Assignment Builder:

Monitor our procurement system for new purchase orders with status "Pending Approval".

For each new PO:
1. Extract PO number, requestor name, vendor, total amount, line items, and department
2. Check if the vendor is on our approved vendor list
3. If vendor is not approved, flag for procurement team review and stop processing

For approved vendors, apply these approval rules:
- Orders under $1,000: Auto-approve immediately
- Orders $1,000 - $5,000: Check if requestor has department manager approval, then process
- Orders over $5,000: Route to finance director for review with budget impact analysis

After approval:
1. Update PO status to "Approved"
2. Send confirmation email to requestor with expected delivery date
3. If amount exceeds $10,000, also notify the VP of Operations

Error handling:
- If vendor portal is unavailable, queue the order and retry in 1 hour
- If budget is exceeded, notify finance team and hold the order
- If no approval response in 48 hours, escalate to next level

Click "Generate" to create the assignment SOP.

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Step 3: Review Generated SOP

Duvo will generate structured SOP. Review to ensure:

• Threshold amounts match your organization's approval matrix

• Escalation paths are correct for your org structure

• All system names are correctly identified

Edit the SOP directly to adjust any thresholds or routing rules.

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Step 4: Add Your Approved Vendor List

If your vendor list isn't in your procurement system, upload it to Files:

1. Go to Assignment Settings > Files

2. Upload your approved vendor list (CSV, Excel, or PDF)

3. The assignment will reference this when validating vendors

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Step 5: Configure Connections

Click "Connections" and connect:

1. Procurement system - Add logins for your PO platform

2. Email - For sending approvals and confirmations

3. Slack (optional) - For real-time notifications to approvers

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Step 6: Test Your Assignment

Run a test with sample purchase orders:

1. Click "Run Assignment"

2. Process a few test POs at different amounts ($500, $3,000, $8,000)

3. Verify each follows the correct approval path

Assignment Running

What to check:

• Did low-value orders auto-approve correctly?

• Did high-value orders route to the right approver?

• Did vendor validation work?

• Did confirmations send to requestors?

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Step 7: Enable Continuous Monitoring

Set the assignment to run continuously or on a schedule:

1. Go to Assignment Settings > Schedule

2. Choose "Continuous" for real-time processing, or

3. Choose "Every hour" for batch processing

4. Save settings

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Expected Results

When your assignment runs successfully, you should see:

In your procurement system:

• Auto-approved POs show "Approved" status instantly

• High-value POs show "Pending [Approver Name] Approval"

• Rejected vendors flagged for review

In approver inboxes:

• Clear approval requests with PO details

• Budget impact information for large orders

• One-click approve/reject options

In requestor inboxes:

• Instant confirmation for auto-approved orders

• Status updates when approvals are pending

• Expected delivery dates

In Duvo:

• Complete audit trail of all decisions

• Approval chain documentation

• Processing time metrics

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Troubleshooting

Orders not being detected

• Check status filter: Verify "Pending Approval" matches your system's exact status name

• Check permissions: Ensure logins can view all departments' POs

• Check polling interval: If using scheduled jobs, orders may be waiting for next cycle

Vendor validation failing

• List format: Ensure vendor names match exactly (watch for "Inc." vs "Inc" issues)

• List location: Verify Files file is attached to this assignment

• Update frequency: Make sure your vendor list is current

Wrong approval routing

• Threshold values: Double-check dollar amounts in SOP

• Org structure: Verify approver names/emails are correct

• Department mapping: Ensure requestors are mapped to correct departments

Budget check errors

• System connection: Verify budget system logins

• Account codes: Ensure PO account codes match budget categories

• Timing: Budget data may be delayed—add buffer for recent transactions

Notifications not sending

• Email connection: Re-authorize if needed

• Recipient addresses: Verify approver emails are valid

• Spam filters: Check if notifications are being blocked

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Take It Further

Once your basic assignment is working, consider these enhancements:

Add budget pre-check

Before processing any PO, check the department's remaining budget.
If the PO would exceed available budget by more than 10%, hold for finance review.
Include budget utilization percentage in the approval request.

Implement rush order handling

If the PO is marked as "Rush" or "Urgent":
- Skip the 48-hour escalation wait time
- Send immediate Slack notification to approver
- If no response in 4 hours, auto-escalate to next level

Add vendor performance scoring

Before auto-approving, check the vendor's performance score in our system.
If score is below 3.5/5, flag for procurement review regardless of amount.
Include vendor rating in all approval requests.

Create spending reports

At end of each week, generate a summary of:
- Total POs processed
- Auto-approved vs manually approved ratio
- Average approval time
- Top vendors by spend
Send report to procurement manager.

Personalize with Assignment Memory

Different users can set their own approval thresholds. Learn about Assignment Memory

• Department Manager: "Auto-approve all purchase orders under $5,000 from approved vendors. Flag anything over $5,000 for my review."

• Director: "Auto-approve all purchase orders under $10,000. For orders between $10,000-$25,000, check if they're budgeted before requesting approval. Anything over $25,000 requires VP sign-off."

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Related Resources

• Human-in-the-Loop - Configure approval workflows for high-value orders

• Assignment Memory - Set personal approval thresholds per user

• Files - Upload approved vendor lists and policies

• My Logins - Securely store procurement system access