Receive a purchase order in Shopify: short, damaged, late

Receive what you counted on the table, not what the packing slip says. Count each line, enter accepted units and rejected units separately, and keep the order open if the supplier still owes you anything. Only accepted units go into stock. When the invoice arrives, check it against the accepted count before you pay.

Three documents, three different truths#

A delivery comes with up to three pieces of paper, and they rarely agree.

The purchase order says what you asked for. The packing slip says what the supplier believes it packed. The invoice says what the supplier will bill you. None of them says what is in the box. Only a count does.

That sounds obvious until a Tuesday with six cartons and a driver waiting. The easy move is to copy the slip into your system. A team that does this ends up with stock that matches the paperwork and not the shelf. Say the slip lists 24 plates and three arrived cracked. The system now shows 24, the shelf holds 21, and nobody finds the gap until the next count, weeks later, with no way to trace it.

Before you open anything, put the purchase order and the packing slip on the table, with a phone or scanner to record numbers. Keep a spot for units you are going to refuse. If cartons hold 6 or 12 units, count units, not cartons. A carton count typed into a unit field is an easy way to get a receipt wrong.

Receive a complete delivery#

Most deliveries are complete, so make this path fast.

1. Open the purchase order for this supplier.
2. Count each line against what is in the box. Scan the barcode if the product has one, or type the number.
3. Compare your count with the packing slip. If they match, move on. If not, recount that line once before you write anything down.
4. Check the total against the order. Anything lower is a short delivery, and anything higher is an over delivery. Both have their own section below.
5. Save the receipt so the quantities reach Shopify.
6. When the invoice arrives, hold it next to the receipt, not next to the order.

Step 3 deserves a rule.

Count first. Read the slip second. If you read the slip first, your eyes see 24 plates and your hands stop at 24.

On a pallet with 200 lines, counting every unit at the door is slow. Our view is to count everything for a new supplier and for expensive lines, and to count cartons on cheap lines from a supplier with a clean record. The risk of the shortcut is plain: you inherit the supplier's mistakes. Decide it per supplier, and write the decision down. Our page on receiving purchase orders by scan shows the same flow on a phone.

What Shopify's own purchase orders do#

Shopify's help center describes receiving on the inventory transfer that is linked to a purchase order, not on the order itself (Shopify help: receiving inventory, checked 14 Oct 2026). You open the transfer, choose Receive items, and pick an action for each line: accept, reject or cancel.

Accepted units become available at the destination location. Rejected units are recorded on the transfer but add nothing to available stock. The transfer stays In progress until every unit is accounted for, and you can receive each shipment as it arrives. Menu names change, so check the page for your own store.

The habits around that screen are the same in any tool, and they are what the rest of this article covers.

Short deliveries: record what arrived, keep the order open#

A supplier ships 120 units against an order of 200 and says the rest follows. Receive 120. Leave 80 outstanding. (Outstanding means ordered minus accepted so far.)

Never receive 200 because the order says 200. Never close the order because the supplier promised to send the rest. A team that closes a short order loses track of the balance, and the supplier has no reason to bring it up. Two months later someone asks why a product is out of stock when "we ordered it."

A partial receipt gives you a status to work from: this order is open, these lines are complete, these lines are owed. Write the expected date for the balance on the order. If the supplier says the balance will never ship, ask for a credit and close the line only after you have it.

Damaged, wrong or extra goods#

Damaged and wrong goods have two numbers, not one: accepted and rejected.

Accepted units are on your shelf and for sale. Rejected units arrived and then went back, or sit in a corner waiting for a return label. They are real units, but they are not stock, and they should not carry a cost into your books. Record them on the receipt so the history shows what the supplier actually sent, then keep them out of your count.

Rejected units are still owed. The supplier owes you a replacement or a credit, so the line should still show them as outstanding. If you treat a rejection as "received" you lose the claim, and if you leave it off the record you lose the evidence.

When more arrives than you ordered, count it, record it, and say so out loud. A supplier that ships 8 against an order of 6 has shipped 8. If you cap the entry at 6, two units sit on your shelf that your system has never heard of. Receive the 8, then decide with the supplier whether you keep the extra and get billed or send it back. Check the delivery note before you accept. An extra carton can be the supplier's packing error or a counting error at your end, and you want to know which.

Damage you find after unpacking is a different case. The receipt is already saved, so correct it with a stock adjustment and a reason ("damaged"), and send the supplier the photos.

Worked example: two lines, one short, one damaged#

Say a purchase order has two lines.

• Mugs: 120 ordered at $4.10 each.
• Plates: 60 ordered at $6.30 each.

The order total is:

120 x $4.10 = $492.00
60 x $6.30 = $378.00
$492.00 + $378.00 = $870.00

The delivery has 120 mugs and 24 plates. Three of the 24 plates are broken. You enter this:

The accepted goods are worth:

120 x $4.10 = $492.00
21 x $6.30 = $132.30
$492.00 + $132.30 = $624.30

Mugs are complete. Plates are not. The balance on the plates line is:

60 - 21 = 39

Those 39 are two different things. Three are the broken units the supplier owes you a replacement for, and 36 have not shipped yet. Their value is:

39 x $6.30 = $245.70
Check: $378.00 - $132.30 = $245.70

Now the invoice. The supplier bills what it shipped, which is 24 plates, not 21:

24 x $6.30 = $151.20
$492.00 + $151.20 = $643.20
$643.20 - $624.30 = $18.90
3 x $6.30 = $18.90

The $18.90 gap equals the three broken plates. That is the amount to raise with the supplier as a credit or a replacement. Without the rejected count, the gap is a mystery on the invoice.

What receiving does to cost#

Receiving is the moment a cost enters your books, so it is also the moment a wrong cost enters them.

Two rules cover most of it. First, rejected units carry no cost into stock. In the example above, your stock is worth $624.30, not $643.20. Second, the supplier's unit price is not your cost. Freight, duty and fees belong in the cost of what you accepted. Our landed cost example walks through the arithmetic with real numbers.

Shopify's help center says shipping, customs duties and other fees can be added as cost adjustments to individual shipments on the linked transfer, and that the transfer shows a cost summary so you can compare the agreed cost with the actual one. The page does not say whether those adjustments change the Cost per item field on the product. Test one order before you rely on it.

When the invoice arrives, compare three numbers: the order total, the accepted value and the invoice total. In our example they are $870.00, $624.30 and $643.20, and each gap has a reason you can name. A gap you cannot name is the one to chase.

A five-line receiving checklist#

1. Count before you read the packing slip.
2. Enter accepted and rejected units on separate lines.
3. Leave the order open for anything still owed, and write the date the supplier promised.
4. Keep the three documents together: order, slip, invoice.
5. Compare the invoice with the accepted count, not with the order.

Do it on the next delivery that comes in. Pick one supplier, count the box before you read the slip, and write down any gap, even a small one. After a few deliveries you will know which suppliers can be trusted and which ones need a recount at the door.