How Invoices Automatically Update Your Stock

See how Officaid deducts stock automatically when you create invoices.

Automatic Stock Deductions When You Invoice

One of the most useful aspects of Officaid's inventory tracking is that stock updates happen automatically. When you create an invoice containing items with inventory tracking enabled, Officaid deducts the invoiced quantity from stock without any manual steps. This keeps your stock levels accurate as you sell.

How It Works

Here is what happens step by step when you create an invoice:

You create an invoice and add items to it, specifying the quantity for each
When the invoice is saved, Officaid checks which items have inventory tracking enabled
For each tracked item, Officaid creates a Stock Out movement equal to the quantity on the invoice
The item's stock level decreases by that amount
The stock movement is recorded with the invoice number in the note field (for example, "Invoice #INV-20260200007")

Officaid handles this automatically. You do not need to go to the item and manually adjust the stock after creating an invoice.

A Simple Example

Say you have an item called "Wireless Keyboard" with a current stock of 30 units. You create an invoice for a client ordering 1 keyboard.

After saving the invoice:

Stock changes from 30 to 29
A Stock Out movement appears in the item's movement history showing -1.00
The note reads "Invoice #INV-20260200007" (or whatever the invoice number is)
The "After" column shows 29.00, confirming the new stock level

Tracing Stock Deductions Back to Invoices

Every automatic stock deduction includes the invoice number in the note field. This creates a direct link between your sales and your inventory, making it easy to answer questions like "when did this stock decrease?" or "which sale caused this deduction?"

To trace a deduction:

1 Go to Sales → Items and click the item name
2 Scroll to the Stock Movements section
3 Look for Stock Out entries with invoice numbers in the note column

Items Without Inventory Tracking

If an item on the invoice does not have inventory tracking enabled, Officaid simply ignores it for stock purposes. The invoice is created as normal, and no stock movement is recorded for that item. This means you can mix tracked and untracked items on the same invoice without any issues.

What About Quotations

Quotations do not affect stock levels. Only invoices trigger automatic stock deductions. This makes sense because a quotation is a proposal, not a confirmed sale. Your stock remains unchanged until the deal is finalized with an invoice.

Frequently Asked Questions

What if I create an invoice but the stock is already at zero?

Officaid still creates the invoice and records the stock deduction. The stock level will go negative, indicating you have sold more than your recorded inventory. This can happen if stock was received but not yet recorded as a Stock In movement.

Can I prevent an invoice from deducting stock?

Stock deductions happen automatically for all tracked items on an invoice. If you do not want a particular item's stock to be affected, you can disable inventory tracking for that item before creating the invoice.

What happens if I delete or edit an invoice?

The stock movement created by the original invoice remains in the movement history. If you need to adjust stock after changing an invoice, you can manually add a correcting stock movement on the item's detail page.

Does converting a quotation to an invoice trigger a stock deduction?

Yes. When a quotation is converted to an invoice, the resulting invoice triggers automatic stock deductions just like any other invoice.

What's Next?

Now that you understand automatic stock updates, explore these related guides:

Managing Stock Movements to manually record stock received and adjustments
Setting Up Inventory Tracking for an Item to enable tracking on more items
Viewing Item Details and Performance to see stock alongside sales insights

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