Projectworks Product Update: January 2025
The holidays are over, and the working year is in full swing! 2025 will be a year of continued growth for Projectworks. We’re looking forward to bringing you:
- advanced reporting;
- budget, resourcing, and time entry enhancements (including changes to how the platform looks and feels);
- and a new Employment Hero leave integration;
among many other updates and improvements.
Stay up-to-date with the latest in Projectworks
Because we’ll be releasing so often, we want to keep you in the loop. Sign up to our new monthly product update from Charlotte, our Product Marketing Manager, to take advantage of the latest features in Projectworks as they drop. You’ll also receive sneak peeks of upcoming features, and have the opportunity to provide feedback on planned releases.
Looking back on 2024: Purchase orders
We’ve got a packed release schedule for 2025 - but before we get into the year, we wanted to highlight a feature that may have slipped by unnoticed in 2024.
Purchase Orders moved out of beta in July 2024, and they fulfil a key function for businesses who work with external suppliers.
Purchase orders 101: What are they?
A purchase order (PO) is a document sent to a supplier to purchase goods and/or services. They document what you intend to purchase and record your transaction, meaning you have complete visibility over your finances. Your purchase order records also let you track how supplier costs change over time.
Benefits of purchase orders in Projectworks
Complete control over your finances
To save time, you can create a purchase order from a template in Projectworks and auto-populate it with the relevant supplier from your accounting system.
Purchase orders are considered a cost against your project. You have the choice to make the order amount (incl./excl. tax) billable or non-billable to your customer, as well as add a markup or markdown.
A key difference between purchase orders and expenses is that you can include multiple line items in a single purchase order (it essentially operates as a group of expenses).
Seamless communication with suppliers
Once you’re happy with your purchase order, you can send it to your supplier directly from Projectworks! Simply enter the supplier email address and hit “Send Email”.
You can even send purchase orders in bulk if you wish.
Once sent, the order status is tracked in Projectworks - so you can be confident you’re up-to-date.
Visibility into purchase order progress
Since purchase orders can be critical for project delivery, it's important to be able to see what items have been receipted (i.e. what suppliers have delivered and/or billed against them).
In Projectworks, you have total flexibility over receipting purchase orders - you can fully receipt a line item or multiple items, with the option to add supporting attachments (like supplier invoices). Importantly, you can also partially receipt an individual line item if a supplier has delivered or billed only part of a specific item. Simply adjust the amount or quantity in the form!
By managing your purchase orders in Projectworks, you can track exactly where specific orders are at in terms of expected delivery date & percentage delivered - helping you run your projects more effectively overall.
Deep integration with Xero and QuickBooks
Save on time and admin by exporting a Projectworks purchase order to Xero or QuickBooks Online as a bill to pay.
Even better, you can reconcile payments against the purhcase order - it’s a two-way sync!
You’ll have a solid understanding of outstanding liabilities, and your project costs will be up-to-date.
Ensure excellent business process with audit logging
Projectworks offers extensive audit logging for purchase orders. The “History” page contains details of saved changes for each order, when it was actioned, and by whom. You will also be able to see all the internal comments entered against the order.
Manage your orders in one place
We understand that a single project can generate a large number of purchase orders - and often, you’re running multiple projects! So we’ve made sure to make them easy to manage.
Each purchase order has a unique ID number. You can find purchase orders by name and ID number using global search, and filter/group them by an extensive range of parameters, including:
- Status
- Exported
- Paid
- Invoiced
- Supplier
- Project
- Project Manager
- Expected Date
How to enable purchase orders
To begin using the purchase order feature in Projectworks, you must:
- Integrate with Xero or QuickBooks Online;
- Enable expenses (Xero | QuickBooks);
- Adjust Access Levels to enable the feature for specific access level users;
- Adjust any other purchase order-related settings to suit your business needs (templates, attachment requirements, & email content).
For any further questions about purchase orders, you can review our detailed help information here or contact [email protected].
Feedback wanted
We're actively working on enhanced resourcing and project schedules in Projectworks. If you’re a current user and would like to preview the proposed changes and help shape their development, book a review session with Vijay Raghuraman, Product Manager. Your expertise helps us create a better platform for professional services.
Stay in the loop
Want to stay up-to-date with Projectworks product updates as they drop? Make sure to check our Release Notes regularly - we update these every 2 weeks. To get monthly updates straight to your inbox, sign up to our product mailing list.
If you’re not already using Projectworks, why not get started today? Our free trial lets you use all of Projectworks' features for 21 days, no strings attached. Learn how you can grow your business and join hundreds of professional services businesses scaling for success.
Read similar resources from Projectworks
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Novigi has an impressive story. Since launching in 2016, they’ve scaled to 550 staff across six offices and two countries, while becoming the fastest-growing professional services firm on the AFR Fast 100 - their story is worth studying.
”When new work comes in, we have the right people, ready to go. Winning work and protecting the team, we never have to choose just one.” How often can you confidently say the same? Facing resourcing questions about upcoming projects can sound simple, but if your schedules are built on assumptions and capacity is only estimated, face it, your resource planning is under-engineered!
