Vendor Statements
A vendor statement is the payables equivalent of a customer statement: the bills a supplier has issued you, what you have paid, and the balance outstanding - the document to reconcile against before you pay.
Menu path: Accounting > Reports > Vendor Statements
URL: https://my.ososs.com/dashboard/reports/vendor-statements
Screenshot from the live OSOSS Dashboard
Why reconcile before paying
Suppliers send their own statements, and the two rarely match first time. The usual causes are all boring and all worth finding before money moves:
| Difference | Usual cause |
|---|---|
| A bill on their statement, not on yours | Never received, or received and not entered |
| A bill on yours, not theirs | Duplicate entry, or entered against the wrong supplier |
| A payment they have not credited | In transit, or an uncleared cheque |
| A credit note missing on one side | A return they have not processed, or you have not recorded |
| Different totals on the same bill | A price or quantity dispute, or freight added later |
Running this statement for the period and reading it beside theirs turns a payment run from an act of faith into a check.
Using it
- Run the statement for the same period the supplier's statement covers, otherwise you are comparing two different windows.
- Work line by line on differences, not on the total. The total tells you there is a problem; the lines tell you which document caused it.
- Resolve before paying. A payment made against a disputed balance is far harder to unwind than a delayed payment.
- Note what you find. Recurring differences with the same supplier usually mean a process problem - bills arriving by email nobody monitors, or freight invoiced separately and never linked.
Tip: Reconcile your largest three suppliers every month and the rest quarterly. Almost all payables error concentrates in the accounts with the most documents.
Warning: Do not pay from the supplier's statement alone. Pay from your own reconciled position, because their statement can include bills you never received goods against.
Related pages
- Suppliers Balance - all supplier balances at a glance
- Supplier Analysis - how you trade with each supplier
- Purchase Invoices - the bills being reconciled