Glossary · also called PR, Requisition, Material request, Indent, Purchase indent
What is a Purchase Requisition?
Purchase requisition: A purchase requisition is an internal request from a department, job or site asking the purchase team to buy specific material or services, with quantities and the date needed. It is approved before any purchase order is placed, so that buying is authorised, linked to a real need and checked against stock already held.
Definition
In many Indian firms the requisition is called an indent; on construction sites it is often a material request. Whatever the name, it separates two decisions: someone who needs material asks for it, and someone with authority approves the purchase. The purchase order — the commitment to a supplier — comes only after that.
A requisition usually records the item, quantity, required date, the job or project it is for and, sometimes, a suggested supplier.
How it works
An example from a panel shop, with illustrative numbers only:
- A sales order for an MCC panel has a BOM needing 24 contactors of one rating.
- Stores has 10 in stock, of which 4 are reserved for another job. Available: 6.
- The shortage of 18 becomes a requisition, needed by the 15th.
- The purchase manager approves it and assigns a supplier.
- Approved requisition lines for the same supplier are combined into one purchase order.
- When the goods arrive, a GRN records receipt, and the supplier invoice goes through a three-way match.
On a construction site the flow is the same, except that the request is checked against site and company stores first, and any balance goes to purchase.
Common mistakes
- Skipping the requisition and phoning suppliers directly, so nobody can see why something was bought.
- Not checking stock and reservations, which leads to duplicate buying.
- No link to the job or project, so material cost cannot be traced.
- Approving without a required date, so urgent items wait behind routine ones.
In Zaptiz
In Zaptiz Electrical, sales order shortages flow into requisitions with a supplier set per line, which are approved and converted to purchase orders by vendor. In Zaptiz Construction, material requests are raised, approved and split into from-stock and to-purchase. Read Automating procure-to-pay for the whole chain.