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Products and services

Add a product or service

Products and services are the items you add to invoices, quotes, credit notes and purchase documents. Setting one up once saves you re-typing its description, price and tax every…

Add a product or service

Products and services are the items you add to invoices, quotes, credit notes and purchase documents. Setting one up once saves you re-typing its description, price and tax every time you sell it — and lets Sales Scribe keep your stock and profit figures right.

Before you begin

  • You need an organisation selected. Anyone signed in with an organisation can add products.
  • It helps (but isn't required) to have set up your tax rates, your product categories and your suppliers first, so you can pick them from the lists.

Open the new product form

  1. Go to Products.
  2. Select New Product (top right). The Add Product window opens.

[Screenshot required: Products page with the New Product button and the product list]

Fill in the details

The form is grouped into sections. Only a few fields are required (marked with a red asterisk); everything else is optional.

Basic Information

  • Name (required) — what the item is called. It appears on documents and in the product list. Duplicate names are allowed, but if you type a name that already exists Sales Scribe shows a gentle warning suggesting you give it a distinct SKU so the two can be told apart.
  • SKU — an optional stock-keeping code, unique within your organisation. Leave it blank if you don't use SKUs (you can have many products without one). Select Suggest to have Sales Scribe generate the next free code from the category's prefix, or type your own. If a SKU is already in use you'll be told to choose another.
  • Description — a longer description that pre-fills the line text when you add the item to a document.

Classification

  • Category — an optional group (for example "Hardware" or "Consultancy"). Choosing a category can auto-fill the Tax Rate, a SKU prefix, the inventory options and the ledger accounts — see Product account codes.
  • Supplier — who you buy it from, if applicable. Selecting a supplier can set the Cost Currency to that supplier's currency.
  • Tax Rate — the tax (VAT) rate that applies when you sell it, for example "Standard (20%)". This flows onto the invoice line automatically.

Pricing

  • Sale Price (required, cannot be negative) — the amount you charge for one unit, before tax, in your organisation's currency. The Sales Currency is fixed to your organisation's currency and shown read-only ("Set in Organization").
  • Cost Price — what the item costs you, in the Cost Currency. Used to work out profit and, for stock items, cost of goods sold.
  • Markup % — optional. If you enter a Cost Price and a markup, Sales Scribe can work out the Sale Price for you; if you type a Sale Price directly, it back-calculates the markup. Selling below cost is allowed — you'll just see a "selling below cost" note.

Note: If your Cost Currency differs from your Sales Currency, an FX Rate field appears and the sale price is converted from the cost at that rate. See Edit or archive a product for how prices update from exchange rates.

Units & Dimensions

  • Default Quantity — the quantity that pre-fills when you add the item to a document (must be greater than 0; defaults to 1).
  • Unit Category (required) and Unit of Measure (required) — how the item is measured. Pick a category such as Count (then a unit like "each"), Weight (kg, g), Time (hour, day), Length, Area or Volume; the Unit of Measure list filters to match.
  • Dimensions — free text, optional.

Inventory

  • Stock Quantity, Reorder Point and GTIN-14 / Barcode — optional fields for stock tracking. To actually track stock levels and record cost of goods sold, use the Inventory Options below — see Inventory and cost of goods sold.

Status & Options

  • Status — Active, Inactive or Archived. New products are Active.
  • Inventory Options — Track Inventory and, when that is on, For Resale. Leave both off for a service or a one-off item. See Inventory and cost of goods sold.

Ledger Accounts

Optional per-product accounts. Leave them blank to use your category or organisation defaults. See Product account codes.

Save

Select Save Product. Sales Scribe checks the required fields and that your Sale Price is not negative, then adds the product to your list.

What happens next

Your new product is available immediately anywhere you build a document. When you add it to a sales invoice, quote or credit note line, Sales Scribe fills in:

  • the description (from the product's Description, or its Name if there's no description);
  • the quantity (from Default Quantity);
  • the unit price (from Sale Price); and
  • the tax rate (from the product's Tax Rate).

You can still change any of these on the individual line. If the document is in a different currency from the product's sale currency, the price is converted at the document's exchange rate.

Troubleshooting

  • "Sale price is required" / "Sale price must be a positive value" — enter a Sale Price of zero or more.
  • "Unit of measure category is required" / "Unit of measure is required" — choose a Unit Category and then a Unit of Measure.
  • SKU already in use — SKUs must be unique within your organisation, and a code can still be reserved by a deleted product. Choose a different code, or select Suggest.
  • "A product named '…' with SKU '…' already exists" — you're creating an exact duplicate (same name and SKU). Change the name or the SKU.
  • A warning that the name already exists — this is only a heads-up; you can still save. Give the product a distinct SKU so you can tell the two apart.
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