Purchase requisition workflow: when the request is the control

A purchase requisition is not a form that slows buying. It is the record that turns a need into a tracked commitment: who asked, what they asked for, at what estimated cost, who approved it, and which budget it affects. Without that sequence, buying is fast and invisible — and invisible buying is the source of the gaps that appear at month-end as unplanned costs with no explanation.

What does a requisition actually control?

Two things: the commitment before it is made, and the trace after it is made. The approval asks whether the need is real, whether the budget can carry it, and whether the supplier being used is the right one. The trace asks whether the purchase that arrived matches the request that was approved.

A requisition that skips approval is not faster buying; it is unrecorded buying. A requisition that captures approval but not the supplier or the budget is a partial record: the commitment exists but the reconciliation has no anchor.

What must the workflow include?

The request (item, quantity, estimated cost, budget line), the approval (who and when, not just a tick), the supplier reference, and the link to the purchase order that results. Each of those is a separate fact; combining them into a single free-text note loses all of them.

The approval must be a named decision, not a signature line. A named decision can be queried; a signature line can only be read. The difference matters when a cost needs explanation six months later.

Where does the requisition report go?

Into the same system that holds the budget and the purchase orders — not a shared folder or an email thread that searches slowly. The point of the workflow is that the same record answers three questions: was the purchase approved, does it match the order, and does the invoice agree with both.

If the requisition lives separately, the link to the budget line and to the purchase order must exist and be checked, not assumed. A missing link does not fail the build; it fails the month-end reconciliation quietly.

When is a requisition too heavy?

When the cost of recording exceeds the cost of the purchase being repeated. A low-value, routine supply does not need the full sequence; what it needs is a single entry that names the supplier, the budget, and the person who approved the exception. Without that, the exception becomes the rule without anyone deciding.

Where this goes wrong

• The approval is a signature with no name attached. The record confirms that someone approved, not who decided or why.
• The requisition captures the need but not the budget. The purchase is approved but the cost has no home, so the budget drifts without a signal.
• The requisition, the order and the invoice are three separate documents with no shared reference. The reconciliation is manual and incomplete by design.

What this does not cover

This does not define the legal requirements for public procurement, tender rules or supplier selection criteria — those are separate obligations with their own timelines, and this article assumes they are handled by the same purchasing process rather than replaced by it. It also does not cover the supplier evaluation itself; see purchase-orders for the three-way match.