Alma Acquisitions Resource Guide

Creating an Invoice Manually

1. Go to Acquisitions >> Create Invoice
2. Click the button next to Manually, then click Next
3. On the Invoice Details page, fields marked with a red asterisk are required by Alma; other fields may be required by your institution
   • Many of the Alma required fields are autofilled by creating an invoice From PO
4. A few critical changes you need to make:
   1. Owner: Confirm that the Invoice Owner is correct according to local practice
   2. Payment Method: Choose from the drop-down
      • Accounting Department: for regular invoices that will be sent to Finance for approval through the automated feed
      • Cash/Credit Card
      • Bank Transfers: often for international purchases
      • Deposit Account
5. Click on Save and Create Invoice Lines.
   • If there’s only one item on the invoice, add that one item as an invoice line
   • If there are multiple items on the invoice, add them all
6. For each invoice line:
   1. Choose the type:
      • Regular: the cost of each item
      • Shipment: shipping costs
      • Use the other types as needed
   2. If your item has a POL, use the PO line field to search by POL number, or click on the menu icon to search by vendor information
   3. Add additional information as needed, including Fund
   4. If you want to add another invoice line, click Add
   5. If this is the only invoice line on the invoice, click Add and close
7. Return to the Summary tab and make sure that the total from the invoice lines matches the total you typed in for the invoice.
   1. If the totals match, click on Save and continue
   2. If the totals don’t match, adjust either the total on the Summary tab or check that you haven’t forgotten to add an invoice line on the Invoice Lines tab. Alma won’t let you save the invoice until these totals match, so you’ll need to fix one of them, then click Save and continue.
8. If your invoice was successfully submitted, you’ll go to the Waiting for approval page; the invoice you just finished should be listed on the Unassigned tab; these invoices are awaiting approval.
9. If your invoice was not successful because there were errors, you’ll go to the In Review Invoices page with your invoice at the top of the list. Correct these errors and resubmit by clicking on Save and continue.

Creating an Invoice from PO Line

The process for creating an invoice from a PO is the same as manual, except that you’ll skip the Invoice Details page and move straight to adding or editing Invoice lines.

Information from the POLs on that PO will be automatically added by Alma (including the correct Invoice Owner), but there are a few critical changes:

• The default Invoice number will be the PO number. You will need to manually change that on the Summary tab to the actual vendor invoice number.
• You may need to add Fund information for some invoice lines, if these weren’t identified during the ordering process.
• You can leave the Discount, Insurance, and Overhead invoice lines at zero, unless you have information to add here.

When you’re finished updating the invoice, click on Save and continue.

Invoicing Serials/Continuous Orders

As with orders, invoicing Continuous orders is largely identical to invoicing One-Time orders. However, there are additional fields on Continuous Order Invoice lines:

1. Check subscription date overlap: If you select this option, Alma checks to see if an overlapping subscription is detected on any other invoice on this PO. If so, an alert message appears when creating the invoice line.
   • Helps prevent you from paying for the same issue or subscription period more than once
   • NOTE: Alma can check only already-saved information using this feature. This already-saved information includes invoice lines in other invoices and previously added invoice lines from the current invoice. Invoice lines you are currently adding are not checked for overlap with other invoice lines you are currently adding. Use the list of invoices lines to check for overlaps before saving.
2. PO Line Subscription dates range: Will auto-populate based on the value in the POL, including both the PO Line Subscription from date and the PO Line Subscription to date.
   • Suggested Best Practice: It is also useful to enter this information in the Invoice Line item Note so that it displays on the Invoice lines tab.
3. Subscription dates range:
   • Required if Check subscription date overlap is selected
   • Indicates the subscription dates covered by this line item
   • Suggested best practice:
     • Only use this field for predictable, easily identifiable ranges
     • When in doubt, use the Additional information field instead
4. Additional information:
   • This field is required if the Subscription dates range field is empty
   • Suggested best practice: Use this field to enter the piece-level information: i.e. issue 12 (March), or if you’re invoicing for the entire year
5. Invoice Lines of Current PO Line: This list includes the last five regular invoice lines associated with this PO line and the dates associated with each invoice line. This would be another way to check for subscription date overlap, as mentioned earlier. In other words, if there had been any previous invoices for this title, they would be in here.
6. Invoice Line Charges section:
   1. Update price, fund, etc. as needed
   2. Add any reporting codes
   3. In the invoice line Note field, add information about what subscription year this is paying for
7. In the PO Line Related Information section, you are able to view PO line information and existing invoices for this PO line by clicking on the blue links.
8. Click Save when you’re done.

Once you finish updating the information on the Invoice Lines tab, make sure to go back and check that it corresponds to the information on the Summary tab, and then proceed as you would for a manual invoice.

Invoice Review

If you review and confirm invoices with an In Review status, you can do this from one of two places:

• Go to Acquisitions >> Invoices >> Review and review each tab: Assigned to Me, Unassigned, or Assigned to Others
• Use the Task List on the Alma home page, either the Task List widget or the icon in the menu bar
  • Click on the section header for Invoices - Review – Without Assignment or Invoices – Review – Assigned to Me to open that tab
  • If you don’t have a Task List widget, click on the plus sign on the home page and then click on the box next to Task List to add it

On the Invoices in Review page:

• Use the facets on the left to limit your list, especially the Alerts facet to limit by what’s wrong or missing from the invoice
• Review the snapshot of information in the list, or click on Edit to review the entire POL
• Edit the invoice to fix what’s wrong, then click Save and Continue to resubmit the invoice for approval