The purchase order management portal in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central lets your vendors access and manage their own purchase orders. You set it up under the portal setup by adding a vendor key that links a username to a specific vendor number.
Each vendor user only needs a Team Member license to use the portal. This keeps the licensing cost low when you give external suppliers access.
You must assign the correct user rights to each vendor user. External users should never have the internal user checkmark enabled, because that grants extra rights in the system.
Setting up the purchase order management portal in Business Central
To get started, open the setup for the purchase order management portal. From here, you select the actions menu and add a vendor key.
Adding the vendor key is where you connect a user to a vendor. You choose the username that will act as the user for your vendor, then enter the vendor number you want to link it to. Once you confirm, the vendor is set up for the portal and works automatically.
Licensing requirements for vendor users
The user you assign to a vendor only needs a Team Member license. You don’t need a full license for each supplier you give portal access to, which makes it practical to roll out access to many vendors without a large licensing bill.
Assigning the correct user rights
The portal works automatically once the vendor key is in place, but you still have to set up the right user rights on each individual user. This is the step that controls what an external user can actually see and do in the system.
If you want to test the portal yourself, you can enable the internal user checkmark on your own account. Do not enable this checkmark for external users. Internal users have extra rights in the system, and you don’t want to hand those rights to a vendor.
Q&A
What license does a vendor user need for the purchase order management portal?
A vendor user only needs a Team Member license to access and manage purchase orders through the portal.
How do you connect a vendor to the portal in Business Central?
Open the purchase order management portal setup, select actions, and add a vendor key. Choose the username that should act as the vendor user, then enter the vendor number to link them. After that, the vendor is set up and the portal works automatically.
Should external users have the internal user checkmark enabled?
No. The internal user checkmark grants extra rights in the system. Use it only for testing on your own account, and never enable it for external vendor users.