Receiving Purchases in Shopify

There are several ways to enter purchases into Shopify. Each method has its own advantages and limitations depending on your workflow and integration needs. Below is a breakdown of the available options from most recommended to least:

1. Create Purchase Orders in Simple RFID

Recommended for most workflows
This method is often the most efficient, as it eliminates the need to input items into multiple systems. You can take advantage of features like label printing, purchase verification & auto-receive— all within Simple RFID.

Pros:

• Seamless label printing of ordered items

• Enables purchase verification 

• Enables auto-receive (setting which automatically adds items to Shopify without the need to “sync”)

• Avoids duplicate data entry
  
  

Cons:

• If the order contains items that won’t be tagged with RFID, they must be entered manually into Shopify

• Ordered items don’t appear as “Incoming” in Shopify
  
  

2. Create Purchase Orders in Stocky

Stocky integrates well with Shopify, and you can easily copy orders from Stocky to Simple RFID. Items entered into Stocky appear in Shopify as "Incoming" rather than "On Hand", which keeps your live Shopify inventory accurate until items are actually received.

Pros:

• Incoming items don’t affect current inventory counts
  
  

• Orders are copied into Simple RFID for printing & scanning
  
  

Cons:

• Stocky provides no API methods to update the status of a Purchase Order, therefore they must be updated manually
  
  
  

3. Create Purchase Orders Directly in Shopify

Creating purchase orders directly in Shopify is a straightforward way to track incoming items, which appear as “Incoming” until received.

Pros:

• Easy to view what’s expected without affecting current inventory
  
  

• Clear visibility of incoming stock
  
  

Cons:

• Shopify does not allow purchase orders to be created via API, so you'll need to recreate each order manually in Simple RFID

• Shopify provides no API methods to update the status of a Purchase Order, therefore they must be updated manually
  
  

4. Add Items as “On Hand” Inventory in Shopify

This option is not recommended. Following this method adds inventory directly into Shopify as "on hand" and then copied to Simple RFID.

Pros:

• Allows for quick stock updates
  
  

Cons:

• No distinction between a purchase and a stock adjustment
  
  

• Not ideal for tracking incoming items
  
  

• Auto-receive must be disabled to prevent quantity duplication