Customer Provided Items
In ERPNext v16, Customer Provided Items are mostly used in contract manufacturing and subcontracting situations where the customer gives the manufacturer some or all of the raw materials they need to make something. In these situations, the manufacturer (your company) only does the Processing or Assembly work and doesn’t buy the raw materials through the normal buying process.
Because the customer provides these items, they can’t be received through the normal Purchase cycle (Purchase Order → Purchase Receipt → Purchase Invoice). Doing this would wrongly treat the customer as a supplier and create extra accounting and procurement records.
ERPNext has a special Customer Provided Item workflow to help you do this right. These items are added to stock through a Stock Entry with the purpose of Material Receipt. This is done based on a Customer Provided Material Request. People often use this feature when a customer hires you to make something and gives you the raw materials you need.
Follow these steps to set up a Customer Provided item
Go to the Item Doctype and add a new item called “Customer Provided.”
Go to:
Home > Stock > Items and Prices > Item
Create a new Item or open an existing one that will be supplied by the customer.
In the Purchase, Replenishment Details section:
- Allow Is Customer Provided
- Make a Default Customer who will give this item
- Make sure that the “Is Purchase Item” box is not checked.
This setup makes sure that:
- You can’t buy the item from suppliers.
- The item is only expected from the customer who ordered it.
- During manufacturing, the system thinks of the item as property of the customer.
When you’re done setting up the item, save it.
How to get an item that a customer gave you?
When a Production Plan is used, Customer Provided Items are usually received as part of the manufacturing process.
If a Production Plan is made:
- First, a Sales Order or a Material Request is used to get the item that needs to be made.
- The Get Items for Work Order button brings in the things needed for production into the Work Order.
- Then, the Get Raw Materials for Production button is used to get the raw materials.
When a part in the BOM is marked as “Customer Provided” and a Material Request is made from a Production Plan:
- ERPNext makes the following things automatically:
- A Material Request of type Buy raw materials that the company gives you
- A Material Request of type Customer Provided for parts that the customer provides
- You can make a Stock Entry with the purpose Material Receipt from the Customer Provided Material Request.
Getting stock through Stock Entry
- Open the Customer Provided Material Request
- Make a Stock Entry
- Make the Purpose “Material Receipt”
- Enter the amounts you got and the target warehouse.
- Send in the Stock Entry
After you send it:
- Stock Given to the Customer The item is put in the chosen warehouse.
- The customer still owns the material.
- In Work Orders, the material is ready to be used.
A single Material Request can have more than one Stock Entry (Material Receipt) record. This lets the customer make partial deliveries. Based on the amounts received, the overall request status will change on its own.
Web Portal for Customer Visibility
Customers can see how their Customer Provided Material Requests are doing through the Customer Web Portal.
- There is a Material Requests section on the portal.
- Only the customer can see their own Material Requests.
- This gives customers the ability to:
- Check the material needs that are still open
- Keep track of how many you got
- Work with the manufacturer to plan deliveries
Important Notes (ERPNext v16):
- When you receive items from a customer, they don’t show up in your accounting records.
- These things are used in production but aren’t counted as company-owned inventory.
- It is best to keep customer-owned materials separate from other items in the warehouse.
- This feature works perfectly with BOMs, Work Orders, and Production Plans.
