that govern whether vendors receive payment, for example, are well-defined. No purchasing takes place without a purchase order, which is entered into the system. Two hard copies of the purchase order are sent to the receiving area and also filed in the accounting office. The vendor also receives a copy of the purchase order. When merchandise is received, it is checked against the purchase order in the receiving area. If all the merchandise on the purchase order is received in the appropriate quantity, one copy of the purchase order is sent to accounting and marked "OK," while the second copy is retained in the warehouse (this is a holdover from the pre-computer system when it was sometimes necessary to have an additional check).
When it receives the hard copy of the purchase order from the warehouse, the accounting department calls up the purchase order on the system and enters each item and quantity received. Once all items have been marked as received, the system indicates that the pu
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