Suppliers

Suppliers are the vendors you buy from. In Spensa, a supplier record holds everything the rest of the app needs to work with that vendor: where order emails go, in which language, your customer numbers, and any minimum order value. Orders, order templates, products, and invoices all hang off your suppliers, so setting them up is one of the first things to do.

What this is for

• Keep a record for each supplier: name, order email address, email language, minimum order value, and customer numbers.
• Create suppliers by hand or ask the assistant to add them for you.
• Edit supplier details at any time.
• Search and sort your supplier list.
• Delete suppliers you no longer work with.

Where to open it

On the web, open the left sidebar and click Suppliers in the Workspace group.

The phone app has no supplier pages. Suppliers show up there inside other flows: you pick a supplier when placing an order, and you read supplier replies in the supplier messages screens. While recording a stock outflow on the phone, you can also create a new supplier on the spot, with just a name.

Access and permissions

Admins and managers can create, edit, and delete suppliers. Other team members do not see the Suppliers page unless you give them a custom role with permission to manage suppliers. Everyone in your organization can see supplier information where it appears elsewhere in Spensa, for example on orders and invoices, and staff members see their location's suppliers when ordering on the phone. Read more in Team and permissions.

What a supplier record holds

• Supplier Name (required) - each name can only be used once in your organization.
• Supplier Email (optional) - the address your order emails are sent to.
• Order email language - German or English. German is the default. This controls the language of the order emails Spensa sends to this supplier.
• Minimum order value (optional) - in euros. Leave it empty if the supplier has no minimum. If you enter a value, you also choose what happens when an order stays below it:
  • Show a warning - the order can still be sent.
  • Block the order - the order cannot be sent until the minimum is met.
• Customer numbers - one optional customer number per location (the app sometimes calls a location an "establishment"). This is the number the supplier uses to identify that location. Spensa includes it in outgoing orders and uses it to match incoming invoices to the right supplier.

Creating a supplier

1. Open Suppliers and click New Supplier.
2. Enter the supplier name. A name only, for example "Metro", is enough to start.
3. Add the order email address if you plan to send orders through Spensa.
4. Choose the order email language.
5. Set a minimum order value if the supplier has one, and choose warning or block.
6. Enter your customer number for each location that orders from this supplier.
7. Save.

One heads-up shown on the form is worth passing on: suppliers can reply to your orders through orders@orders.spensa.ai. Tell your supplier about this before sending your first order, so their reply does not get missed on their side.

Adding suppliers with the assistant

If your supplier list is still empty, the page offers two buttons: Ask the agent to add them and Add manually, plus a "See how it works" link. The first button opens the assistant with a ready-made request. You list your suppliers in plain language, names are enough, and the assistant creates them for you. You can also ask the assistant to update supplier details later. See The assistant.

Spensa never creates suppliers on its own

This is important to know when you start uploading invoices: Spensa reads invoices, but it only matches them against suppliers you already have. It never invents a new supplier from an invoice.

When an invoice arrives, Spensa first looks for a supplier whose customer number for that location matches the invoice. If there is no match, it picks the best fit among your existing suppliers. If nothing fits, the invoice stays without a supplier, and it cannot be approved until you assign one of your suppliers or create the missing one. So if invoices from a new vendor come in, create that supplier first. See Invoices.

Editing a supplier

Click a supplier card in the list to open its edit form; there is no separate viewing page. Change what you need and save. Changes apply from then on: for example, a new order email address or language is used for future orders, not past ones.

Finding suppliers in the list

Each card shows the supplier's name and order email address. Type in the search box to find suppliers by name; small typos are fine. You can sort the list by name, ascending or descending, and it loads more suppliers as you scroll.

Deleting suppliers

Deleting a supplier removes far more than the record itself, so read this before you do it.

1. On the Suppliers page, open the three-dot menu and choose Edit.
2. Select the suppliers you want to remove.
3. Click the delete button and confirm. The dialog reminds you: "This action cannot be undone."

What happens then:

• All of the supplier's products are deleted from your catalogue.
• All orders, order templates, delivery notes, and order conversations with that supplier are deleted.
• The supplier's slots in your order schedule are removed.
• Invoices are kept. They lose their supplier and show as unassigned, but the invoices themselves and their history stay.

If you only stopped ordering from a supplier for a while, consider keeping the record. There is no way to bring the deleted products, orders, and templates back.

How suppliers shape ordering and invoices

Once a supplier is set up, its details do quiet work all over Spensa:

• Every order goes to exactly one supplier. The order email is sent to the supplier's email address, written in the chosen language, and includes your customer number for the ordering location.
• Supplier replies come back through orders@orders.spensa.ai and appear as a conversation on the order, on the web and in the phone app's supplier messages.
• If the supplier has a minimum order value, Spensa checks it when the order is sent and warns or blocks, depending on your setting.
• Each order template belongs to one supplier, and its items are that supplier's products.
• Incoming invoices are matched to a supplier using the customer number or the best fit among your suppliers, and invoice lines are matched against that supplier's products.

How this connects to other parts of Spensa

• Orders - orders are sent to the supplier's email address in its language, with your customer number; minimum order values warn or block at order time.
• Order conversations - supplier replies to orders arrive as message threads.
• Order templates - every template belongs to one supplier.
• Order schedule - schedule slots are tied to suppliers.
• Invoices - invoices must be matched to one of your suppliers before they can be approved.
• Product Catalogue - every product belongs to exactly one supplier, and you can filter the catalogue by supplier.
• The assistant - the assistant can create and update suppliers for you.
• Mobile app - staff pick suppliers when ordering and read supplier messages on the phone.

Good to know

• You can have up to 500 suppliers in your organization.
• Supplier names are unique. If a name is taken, Spensa tells you: "Supplier with the given name already exists."
• Entering a minimum order value starts with the warning behavior; you can switch it to blocking. Clearing the value turns the check off entirely.
• A supplier created on the phone during a stock outflow has only a name. Add the email address, language, and customer numbers later on the web before sending orders.
• Clicking a supplier always opens its edit form; supplier details such as products and orders live on those features' own pages.