Dispatch stock from an invoice

Stock leaves when the invoice is dispatched or collected — never when it is approved. The dispatch preview shows what ships, what stays on backorder and what the supplier sends.

Where it is

Sales → Invoices — The Dispatch panel is on the left of the invoice.
Inventory → Dispatch — The warehouse board: every invoice with goods still to leave.

Settings for this

Settings → Orders → Customer updates — "On its way" email to the customer when a shipment is recorded.
Settings → Shipping & freight — Freight margin, rounding and carriers used when you book freight.

Dispatching is what takes stock out. Approving an invoice never does. The invoice can be dispatched once it's approved.

From the invoice

Open the invoice. The Dispatch panel on the left shows the status and what's Ready to pick, On backorder, Drop-ship (supplier) and Already shipped.
Optional: Mark as Picked, and More → Pick List to print the pick sheet.
Press Dispatch (sent by courier or delivered) or Collected (the customer picked it up). The strip above the lines offers the same as Pick & dispatch / Dispatch available and Customer pickup.
The preview (Pick & dispatch or Customer pickup) lists what's Shipping now, what's Staying on backorder and what's Drop-ship (the supplier sends it — don't pick it). Untick a line or lower its quantity to hold it back. Nothing has moved yet.
Press Dispatch N units / Hand over N units. Stock comes out of the warehouse; batch and serial items go earliest-expiry or oldest first unless the picker chose them.
After a dispatch you're asked for the carrier and tracking — see Shipment tracking.

Partial dispatch: whatever you held back or didn't have stays open, the invoice reads partially shipped, and the next dispatch offers the rest. See Backorders.
Nothing to pick (labour or service only): record Collected or Delivered, or Nothing to dispatch on this invoice so the order can close.
Workshop job invoices are a handover, not a pick: once the job is finished, mark Collected or Delivered. Until then the strip says the handover waits on the build.
Franchise orders (head office): the invoice must be paid in full before head office dispatches.
Undo dispatch puts shipped goods back into stock and re-reserves them.

The Dispatch board

Inventory → Dispatch is the warehouse's view of the same invoices: lanes for on hold, to pick, picking, to pack and dispatched, with courier cut-offs. It moves no stock itself — goods still leave through this same dispatch preview. See The Dispatch board and Pick, pack and dispatch. You need the dispatch permission to use it.

Who can do it

Anyone who can open the invoice can dispatch from it. The Dispatch board needs the dispatch permission in Settings → Roles.

If something's not right

No Dispatch buttons — the invoice isn't approved yet ("Goods can be dispatched once the invoice is approved"), or it's a job invoice whose job isn't finished.
"Nothing can ship yet" — none of it is on the shelf, or what is there is held for other orders. Receive the backorder PO first.
"Every remaining line is drop-shipped" — close those off from the supplier's PO once they ship.
Dispatching on credit — the strip warns when goods are going out with money still owing.