Vendor portal guide (for suppliers)
What this page is — a guide written for you, the supplier, for the portal your customer has invited you to use.
What it is for — sending your invoices to the company that buys from you, watching each one move from received to paid, and keeping the details they hold about you correct.
The problem it solves — invoices e-mailed to an individual disappear into somebody's mailbox. You cannot tell whether yours was received, whether anyone has a question about it, or when it will be paid, so you chase by telephone and hope.
Address: the link in your invitation, ending in /vendor
Sign-in: the e-mail address your invitation was sent to
Why you would use it
Everything you send through the portal is attached to your company's record at the buyer, and every step is timestamped where both sides can see it. When a question arises, it arrives as a question on that invoice rather than as a phone call about "the one from last month". When payment is scheduled, you are told the date. When it is paid, you get remittance advice naming the invoices it settles.
Before this works
Your customer must have invited you. There is no self sign-up, by design: it is what lets the buyer be certain that an invoice in their system really came from you.
You need the invitation e-mail, and you need to be able to receive mail at the address it was sent to. If the invitation has been lost, ask your contact at the buyer to send it again.
Signing in
- Open the link in your invitation, or the address your contact gave you, ending in
/vendor. - Sign in with the e-mail address the invitation was sent to.
- If you have never set a password, use Forgot password on the sign-in page and set one. Your customer never sees it.
The home page greets you, names the company you are invoicing, and shows how many of your invoices are under review, waiting on you, scheduled for payment and paid.
Several people at your company can be invited. Each signs in with their own address and sees the same invoices, so an accounts mailbox and a named account manager can both have access.
Uploading an invoice
- Go to Invoices, or use the upload area on the home page.
- Drop in one file. One invoice per file: a single PDF containing five invoices cannot be processed as five.
- Fill in what you are asked for. It is optional, but it is worth doing — see below.
- Upload. A confirmation appears with a link to that invoice's own page.
What you provide
| Field | Needed? | Why it helps |
|---|---|---|
| The file | Required | PDF, JPEG or PNG, up to the size your customer allows, at most 15 MB |
| Your invoice number | Optional | Lets duplicates be caught before the document is even read, so you do not accidentally send the same invoice twice |
| Amount and currency | Optional | Checked against what is read from the document; a mismatch is spotted early |
| Purchase order reference | Optional, sometimes required | Some buyers require it on every invoice. If yours does and you leave it out, the invoice is held for review |
| A note | Optional | Anything the reviewer should know, for example that this replaces an earlier invoice |
There is a limit on how many files you may upload per day, set by your customer. If you hit it, the message says so and you can continue tomorrow.
What each status means
| Status | What is happening | What you should do |
|---|---|---|
| Received | We have your file; it has not been read yet | Nothing |
| Processing | It is being read and checked | Nothing |
| Under review | A person at the buyer is looking at it | Nothing |
| Needs information | The reviewer has asked you a question | Answer it — see below |
| Accepted | It has been recorded as a bill in their accounts | Nothing; watch for the payment |
| Rejected | It could not be accepted, and the reason is shown | Correct the invoice and upload it again |
| Scheduled | It is in an approved payment run, with a date | Nothing |
| Paid | Payment has been made | Reconcile it against your bank |
Accepted does not yet mean paid, and it does not always mean approved: at some buyers an accepted invoice still goes through an internal approval before payment is arranged. The status you see is derived from their records at the moment you look, so it never drifts from what they actually hold.
Answering a question
When an invoice is marked Needs information, you are e-mailed and the invoice page shows the reviewer's question.
- Open the invoice from Invoices.
- Read the question on the timeline.
- Write your answer in the reply box. Attach one extra file if it helps, for example a purchase order, a delivery note or a tax certificate.
- Send. The invoice returns to the reviewer's queue with your answer attached, and its status changes to under review.
Every message, decision and payment event stays on that invoice's timeline, so anyone at either company can see what was asked and what was answered.
KYC documents
Most buyers need proof of who you are before they can pay you. The KYC documents page lists exactly what this buyer asks for, each with its own status: not uploaded, awaiting review, approved, rejected or expired.
For each one, upload the file, add the document number, and add the validity dates where the document has an expiry. Documents that expire cannot be saved without an expiry date, because the buyer needs to know when to ask you for a fresh one.
- A rejected document shows the reviewer's reason. Upload a corrected version.
- Uploading the same document type again before it has been reviewed replaces your earlier upload rather than queueing two.
- You are e-mailed before an approved document expires, so you can send the renewal in good time.
Where your buyer requires KYC, invoices you send before your required documents are approved are held for review rather than being accepted. Getting these done once, early, removes a recurring delay from every invoice afterwards.
Keeping your profile current
Profile shows your company as the buyer holds it: legal name, billing address, contact details, tax numbers, bank details masked to the last few digits, and payment terms.
| What you change | What happens |
|---|---|
| Address, contact name, e-mail, phone | Saved straight away |
| Tax numbers | Becomes a request the buyer has to approve; shown as pending until they decide |
| Bank details | Becomes a request the buyer has to approve, and their new invoices are held until it is decided |
That deliberate friction on bank details protects both sides: bank-change fraud is the most common attack on accounts payable, and a request that a person has to approve is much harder to fake than an e-mail. Expect your contact to telephone you to confirm a bank change on a number they already have. That is the process working.
You are e-mailed when a request is approved or rejected.
Payment status
The Payments section on your profile page lists what the buyer has paid you: date, amount, reference and the invoices each payment settled.
You are told twice. When a payment run containing your invoices is approved, you get a message with the scheduled date. When the payment is actually posted, you get remittance advice naming the reference and the invoices it settles. The same events appear on each invoice's timeline.
Worked example
Alpha Traders is invited by its customer. Priya, who runs their accounts, signs in, sets a password, and starts with the KYC documents page: she uploads the registration certificate, the tax card and a cancelled cheque, and all three are approved within two days.
She then uploads invoice AT/2026/0042 for 11,800, typing the invoice number and the purchase order reference from the customer's order. Two hours later the status is Under review; the next morning it is Accepted and the e-mail names the bill it became.
A week later she receives a message that payment is scheduled for the 18th, and on the 18th remittance advice arrives naming AT/2026/0042 and the payment reference. She reconciles it against the bank statement without telephoning anybody.
Troubleshooting
| What you see | Why | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| The sign-in does not recognise you | You are using a different address from the one invited | Sign in with the invited address, or ask for an invitation to the one you use |
| The portal says access is not available | Your access was ended, or the buyer has closed their portal | Contact your buyer |
| The file is refused as the wrong type | Only PDF and common image formats are accepted | Save or scan it as a PDF |
| The file is refused as too large | It is over your buyer's limit, or over 15 MB | Scan at a lower resolution, or split a bundled document into one invoice per file |
| You cannot upload any more today | You have reached the daily limit your buyer set | Continue tomorrow, or ask them to raise it |
| Your invoice stays under review | Something on it needs a person's attention | Wait for the question, or ask your contact |
| Your invoice was rejected as a duplicate | The buyer already holds that invoice number from you | Check your own records before sending it again |
| The reply box is missing | Replies open only while an invoice is marked as needing information | Contact the buyer directly for anything else |
| An accepted invoice has no payment date yet | It has not been put into a payment run | Wait for the scheduled message, or ask about payment terms |
Related pages
- Vendor portal setup — for the buyer's administrator
- Reviewing vendor invoices — for the buyer's reviewers