Blocking is not a note. It is the one vendor status that the rest of the product actually enforces.
What it stops
- No purchase order.
- No bill.
- No payment.
- No putting them on a project.
Every one of those is refused at the point somebody tries it, with the vendor named and the reason you typed shown on screen:
Metro Freight Movers is blocked, so a bill cannot be raised against them. Reason on the record: Two consignments short-delivered, dispute open since August. Unblock them from the vendor record if this has been settled.Why the reason travels with it
Because the person who blocked a vendor is almost never the person who next tries to pay them. Without the reason on the refusal, the next step is a message asking why, and the step after that is somebody overriding it because nobody could remember.
Always type a reason. The field is what turns a block from an obstacle into a decision. “Blocked” with no reason gets unblocked by the first person it inconveniences.
Blocking does not delete anything
Orders, bills and payments already raised stay exactly as they are. Blocking is about what happens next, not about rewriting what happened. A vendor in dispute still has to be reconciled, and you cannot reconcile records that vanished.
A blocked vendor does not wake up
The rule that moves a vendor back to active when work happens skips blocked ones entirely. Nothing quietly reactivates a supplier you have stopped dealing with.
When to block
| Situation | Block? |
|---|---|
| Quality dispute, unresolved | Yes. That is what it is for. |
| Their papers expired | Yes, until they send fresh ones. |
| They went quiet for a year | No — that is inactive, and it happens by itself. |
| You simply stopped using them | No. Inactive. |
| Suspected fraud | Yes, immediately, and write the reason. |
The distinction between blocked and inactive is intent. Inactive means nothing happened. Blocked means somebody decided.
Unblocking
From the vendor record. They return to the stage they can transact from, and the block and its reason stay in the record’s history — so “have we had trouble with them before” has an answer.
Where to go next
Something missing or wrong here? Tell us. A question that needed asking usually means a page that needed writing.