Procurement from sourcing to license¶
LicenseTrack keeps requests traceable while allowing the route to match what is actually being acquired.
Sourcing request -- paid purchase --> Pending order --> License record
|
+-- zero-cost freeware/open source ----------> License record
Admins and Editors can work the pipeline. Viewers do not have access to the procurement workspaces.
1. Sourcing¶
A sourcing request is the quote-stage parent. It stores supplier and contact context, notes, quote evidence, and one or more planned license lines. Each line holds the applicable license-record fields, including publisher, description, type and metric, quantity and quantity per unit, pricing, currency, dates, references, ownership contacts, notes, and custom fields for one intended entitlement. Those line values remain editable through pending order and final conversion so the active license does not silently lose information entered earlier in procurement.
Admins can hide a custom field from sourcing forms when its value is only known later, such as an invoice date. The field remains available during pending-order conversion and on the resulting license. If an existing sourcing line already has a value when the field is hidden, editing the line preserves that value.
Use multiple lines when one supplier quote covers several products. Expand the request row to edit individual lines. Request-level actions manage the quote, conversion, or cancellation of the whole request.
Active sourcing rows start expanded so same-supplier requests can be scanned without opening each parent first. Collapse rows individually when you need a shorter overview.
Use Edit Sourcing Request to update the supplier, contact, request notes, and every open line in one save. Publisher, description, type, quantity, estimated prices, currency, dates, and line notes are validated together; converted and cancelled lines stay read-only. The save is atomic, so a rejected line does not leave the rest of the request partially updated.
When creating a sourcing request with a quote attachment, the form can preview PDF, image, and text files before save. Expand the preview for detailed review or return to the split view while entering line data. Unsupported file types remain attachable but show that an inline preview is unavailable.
The request supplier is the proposed target for the complete purchase, not a copy of historical supplier ownership. It can remain unassigned while sourcing is unresolved and is human-editable across renewals, but paid lines cannot move to a pending order until one supplier is selected. Changing it updates the compatible open lines; converted and cancelled history is left unchanged.
Renewal sourcing records are created automatically when a renewal begins. When several renewal lines should end on the same date, coterm merge combines them while preserving their predecessor relationships. If the historical supplier suggestions differ, the new request remains unassigned until procurement chooses one target supplier. Coterm lines must use one currency, but their historical unit prices may differ. The merged request sums each line's own value and leaves the merged unit price blank when there is no single representative price. For other standard and custom fields, one common nonblank value is retained; conflicting values are left blank for review on the merged line.
For freeware or open-source requests, set the line's optional License Type to Freeware / Open Source. Converting that line creates an active Registry license directly. It preserves the sourcing relationship and Request Date but does not create a pending order, Purchase Date, PO, invoice, contract, or purchase price. In a mixed request, one conversion action sends the free lines to the Registry and the paid lines to the pending order.
Freeware/open-source lines do not show license acquisition-price fields because their acquisition cost is zero. Perpetual and OEM lines retain their acquisition pricing independently of support.
Perpetual, OEM, freeware/open-source, subscription, and SaaS lines also expose Maintenance / Support:
- Included keeps support on the parent line. For perpetual, OEM, and freeware/open-source lines, support can be entered as a flat coverage fee or as covered quantity times support unit price. For subscription and SaaS lines, included support uses the subscription start/end dates and the subscription acquisition total, so the derived coverage dates and cost are hidden in the forms. The calculated or derived total contributes to the sourcing estimate and pending-order total exactly once.
- Separately tracked offers an explicit Add maintenance line action. The new line is prefilled but editable, follows the paid PO path, and retains its parent relationship during conversion. This option is available only for perpetual, OEM, or freeware/open-source parents. A different support supplier creates a separate linked sourcing request. If a later renewal covers several eligible parent purchases, the resulting maintenance license can be linked to the additional parents from License Details.
- Unknown and Not applicable do not create another line.
Freeware with a positive included-support cost follows the PO path because the support purchase needs normal procurement evidence.
Support prices always describe the displayed coverage period. When coverage is renewed, the new coverage becomes a new procurement/license line instead of overwriting the expired period. Reports annualize recurring multi-year records and allocate selected report ranges by overlapping days.
Dates entered during sourcing and pending-order work are planning values. The license manager confirms the delivered entitlement and support start/end dates during final conversion because publisher dates can change between quote, order, and delivery.
2. Pending orders¶
Convert sourcing when the purchase is ready for procurement tracking. The sourcing lines become editable pending-order lines under one order-level record. The order can start with a real PO number, a procurement reference such as an internal request or approval number, or only the generated Pending Order ID while the formal PO is still being created.
You can add the PO number later, attach the PO document when it is available, adjust lines, or add a forgotten line before final conversion. LicenseTrack will not convert a pending order into active licenses until a real PO number is recorded.
One pending order has one supplier. An unassigned sourcing request adopts the supplier of an existing pending order; a conflicting request is rejected instead of being combined with that order.
Supplier agreement is based on the canonical organization ID, not spelling in a legacy mirror. A name, alias, case variant, or whitespace variant that resolves to the same organization is compatible, and request, open-item, pending-order, and converted-license mirrors are written with that organization's canonical name. Different organizations remain a conflict.
Quote evidence remains connected to its sourcing origin and is visible from the pending order action menu. The PO number and procurement reference are metadata; the pending-order database relationship - not matching PO text - connects evidence and history.
3. Convert to licenses¶
When fulfillment is complete, convert the pending order. A single-line order can use the focused conversion form; a multi-line order can convert all lines in one review. Each line becomes a separate license.
During conversion you can:
- review dates, ownership, pricing, and license type;
- upload the invoice;
- copy shared PO-level fields across batch lines;
- select explicit parents for maintenance lines; and
- confirm renewal successors and coterm relationships.
Each staged Quote, Purchase Order, Invoice, EULA, or Entitlement category has a Single / Shared scope switch. Shared makes its files visible on every license created from that order or manual batch. Specific license attaches it only to the selected resulting line. Quote, Purchase Order, and Invoice default to shared scope; EULA and Entitlement default to one license, preserving the earlier behavior unless the scope is changed.
Conversion captures Request Date from the sourcing line. The license manager confirms the actual Purchase Date during conversion; it is not inferred from the pending-order creation timestamp. Those milestones remain editable for imported or legacy data.
The pending-order supplier is the final procurement supplier used by each resulting license. Earlier license suppliers remain historical context and are not overwritten or enforced on the renewal.
Evidence ownership¶
Evidence is scoped to the workflow record that owns it:
| Evidence | Initial scope | After license conversion |
|---|---|---|
| Quote | Sourcing request | Copied into the pending-order procurement bundle |
| Purchase order | Pending order | Shared by default; one resulting license when selected |
| Invoice uploaded during conversion | Pending order | Shared by default; one resulting license when selected |
| Quote, PO, invoice, EULA, or entitlement uploaded during conversion | Pending order or manual creation batch | Per-category choice between all resulting licenses and one selected license |
| Document added later from License Details | License | Single stays on that license; Shared uses its pending-order scope or normalized PO number |
Pending-order identity takes precedence over PO metadata: two unrelated pending orders never share evidence merely because their PO numbers match. For direct or manual license records, a newly uploaded document explicitly marked Shared is visible to licenses with the same trimmed PO number. Single uploads remain on their selected license. Existing documents are not moved, reassigned, or backfilled when this scope metadata is introduced.
Active and historical sourcing and pending-order rows expose evidence actions from the row action menu. Filenames are shown directly in the Download and Delete actions so multiple quotes or PO files remain distinguishable.
History and recovery¶
Converted and cancelled sourcing requests and pending orders move to searchable, paginated history tables. History rows are read-only for record fields, but evidence can still be downloaded or removed when the user has permission. History rows retain identifiers, notes, prices, and evidence links. A converted sourcing line can link forward to its pending order or directly created freeware license; a converted pending-order line can link to its resulting license.
CSV exports name these internal row identifiers explicitly: Sourcing Request ID, Sourcing Line ID, Pending Order ID, and Pending Order Line ID. They are distinct from commercial PO numbers and display-only line ordering. A sourcing line carried into a pending order retains the same line row, so its Sourcing Line ID and Pending Order Line ID intentionally have the same numeric value.
The License Details History section exposes the same procurement trail in reverse, letting you navigate from an entitlement back to its quote and PO work.
If evidence transfer fails after license creation, the licenses remain committed and the order records a recoverable transfer status. LicenseTrack retries the transfer, and Admins or Editors can request another retry without reconverting the order. Quote and invoice transfer phases are committed independently, so a later status failure does not remove evidence that was already stored. When an invoice was supplied during conversion, retry cannot mark the transfer complete unless the required invoice evidence still exists in document storage.
For a multi-line pending order, conversion must include every eligible line exactly once. Missing, duplicate, already converted, or ineligible line IDs are rejected before LicenseTrack locks the order or creates any licenses.
Warning
Converted records are locked. Add late evidence as a documented amendment; do not try to reopen or recreate the original conversion.