QuickBooks Enterprise v20 Advanced Inventory Alternate Vendors

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Intuit just released QuickBooks 2020 Desktop, and over the next few days and weeks QuickBooks Enterprise Users will be notified about the availability of the initial release of the Enterprise Solutions v20 software.

Insightful Accountant was privy to various pre-release versions of QuickBooks Enterprise v20 during development and has had communications with Intuit personnel, including product managers and developers, to help you learn about the new products. This article takes a closer look at one of the features released as part of the QuickBooks Enterprise v20.

If case you haven't read my article summarizing the Desktop Products then the chart below, courtesy of Intuit, reflects which new features are available in which QuickBooks releases. Of course, I would encourage you to read 'My QuickBooks Desktop 2020 Summary article'.

Be certain to tune in for the September edition of QB Talks scheduled for 2 PM Eastern on September 18, 2019 to hear about QuickBooks 2020, there will be more information about that webinar outlined in a future article. You can register HERE.

Alternate Vendors

While QuickBooks has offered the convenience of allowing Users to associate a ‘Preferred Vendor’ with Inventory Items, it has previously not offered the ability to track ‘Alternate Vendors’ or compare prices offered from multiple vendors while creating purchase orders to allow users to get the best deal. 

New to QuickBooks Enterprise v20 Advanced Inventory (Platinum Subscription holders) in both the U.S. and Canada (but not in the U.K., at this time), is a feature that will greatly enhance the ability of inventory-centric businesses to make better purchasing decisions and improve profitability. You can now associate up to four (4) Alternate Vendors with each of your items, and you can also assign unique vendor part numbers, costs, and lead times to each vendor for each item as well. All of this is designed to give QuickBooks Enterprise Advanced Inventory users more choice in their buying decisions.

While Intuit reports that the new item tab in the vendor center contains all the details of the inventory and non-inventory purchases from vendors during the last 12 months, the Alternate Vendor feature (at least at present) only is applicable for Inventory Item vendors. I for one see this feature being just as applicable to non-inventory, service and other-charge items, but those items haven't offered Preferred Vendors either in the past, anyway I hope maybe Intuit will 'fix all of that' at some time in the future.

As I mentioned above, this is an Advanced Inventory feature, so if you are not already using QuickBooks Enterprise Advanced Inventory you will have to activate it to use Alternate Vendors. You must have at least one of the Advanced Inventory (Multiple Inventory Locations, Serial/Lot Numbers, FIFO, Barcodes, Site Operations, or the new Landed Cost) features enabled for Alternate Vendors to be available in the Vendor Center, Items and Purchase Orders functional areas.

Setting-up Alternate Vendors

Let's begin our tour of this feature by looking at how some of the QuickBooks features have changed, starting with the Vendor Center. When you look at Vendor Information you might not even notice the fact that a new 'Items' tab has been added, as shown below.

If we look more closely (as you can see at the top of next page) you can see that some of the information recorded under this tab, for every item you associate with an alternate vendor the last price at which you purchased that item, the last quantity and last order date are recorded, the price set for the item, and the vendor's lead time can also be incorporated into the record to give you better buying options. A new field for recording the vendors unique part number has also been added to this new data set, but at present it isn't used elsewhere within QuickBooks.

So, I know what you are thinking... "how do I suddenly get all this new pricing information into my QuickBooks for each of my Vendors and the Items they sell me?"  Well, Intuit thought of that as part of this new feature.

Importing Alternate Vendor Items

You can import Vendor item price lists which can include their pricing, lead time, unit of measure, unique part number, unique description, notes, etc. To import this data, select Vendors, then choose the Vendor Center, click on the Items tab, then from the Vendor Center menu bar select Excel, then choose Add/Edit Multiple List Entries, select Yes, and choose Vendor Items. You are ready add your data in using this feature, if you are not familiar with how to use Add/Edit Multiple List Entries, see the Interactive Help for details.

Managing Alternate Vendors from Items

You can also assign or manage Alternate Vendors directly from within the create/edit window of any item adjacent to where you normally assign the Preferred Vendor. A new Alternate Vendor dialog button has been integrated into the interface that opens a Manage alternate vendors window (both shown below). 

The Manage alternate vendors window lists the Preferred vendor (first) then the four Alternate vendors (in alphabetical order) with the same information (regarding the Item from which you accessed the list) as would appear in the Vendor Center for each vendor and item. You can access the vendor/item details by clicking on the Status button on the right side of the window.

Making Purchase Comparisons

When it's time to purchase items, you can compare alternate vendor information along with your preferred vendor pricing during the process of creating a Purchase Order.  While creating a purchase order, select the Compare vendor icon (as shown in the illustration below). QuickBooks displays the Compare Vendors information window allowing you to see the last price, quantity, order date, lead (delivery time required), and notes for your Preferred and all applicable Alternate Vendors for that item.

Then select a Vendor and choose View Vendor Price (as shown below). When the View Vendor Price window is displayed you can view the amount of the last purchase order or the price you imported from the vendor (whichever is applicable). You can repeat these steps for different vendors if you want to see how prices will compare for the purchase order amount overall.

This new feature has a lot of potential, and I can see a lot of beneficial use for those businesses that are using 'Advanced Inventory' who have thought about going to a 3rd-party solution because of limitations of QuickBooks Enterprise. With a few more tweaks and improvements this feature can go a long way into enhancing vendor pricing options and creating true price savings, as well as facilitating expedited delivery (via the use of the Lead Time field, which presently is just a number).

Like many new features associated with QuickBooks Enterprise, only time will tell. Will they continue to build them out and make them truly beneficial, or will they simply be of partial benefit...I hope with a little more work that Alternate Vendors becomes a win for everyone.

That's a wrap for my coverage of the new Alternate Vendor feature in QuickBooks Enterprise (V20) Advanced Inventory, but for an overview of all the QuickBooks 2020 features be sure to check-out my QuickBooks Desktop (for Windows) 2020 Summary here, as well as the companion QuickBooks for Mac 2020 Summary which can be found here. I will also be continuing this series on the individual QuickBooks 2020 features every day over the next couple of weeks check back in our headlines.

Editor's Acknowledgements

My very special thanks go out to Laura Madeira who helped cross-check my work with her own to make certain that we were consistent in providing accurate information regarding this 2020 release. For the official Intuit version of “QuickBooks Desktop 2020 – What’s New and Improved” you will find Laura Madeira's article posted at this Firm of the Future blog website. 

I also want to thank the following Intuit personnel for their dedication not only in providing information, briefings and responding to questions, but in guiding the actual product developments within QuickBooks Desktop and this release: Chetana Arakanakere, Rachna Arya, Nipun Bhatia, Aditya Dixit, Varshitha Gokari, Sumit Poddar, Raman Verma. Of course there are entire teams, composed of hundreds of Intuit personnel, behind these people that make the magic happen and too often we forget to say, thank you, to them as well; so to all involved, "THANK YOU"!