Let agents buy

An agent can notice that something is running low, find the right item at a vendor you trust, and propose the purchase. It never pays. You confirm the proposal, pay the vendor the way you pay today, and record the payment; the purchase is on the books the same day, with its receipt attached.

1. Turn it on and list your vendors

Open Settings → Billing → Limits as an owner.

1. Turn on Agent purchases for the account.
2. Under Vendors, add each vendor an agent may buy from: its web address, a name, what it sells, and the agents allowed to buy there.
3. Open the vendor's drawer and fill in what only a person may write:
   • Payee — who you pay and how. Agents read the payee's name, never the account details or instructions.
   • Contacts — the e-mail addresses an agent may write to about an order. An agent can e-mail no other address at this vendor.
   • Approver — the one member who confirms this vendor's purchases, if not every owner and admin.
   • Payment terms and expense role — when the payable is due and which expense account the purchase books to.
4. Give each agent that buys its caps: per purchase, per run, per day, per month and per vendor. A proposal that would cross one is refused, naming the cap.

2. Decide who confirms

Under Who confirms a purchase, choose for the account (and override per agent):

• A person always — the default. Every purchase waits in Your Call.
• Up to an amount — purchases at or under the amount, while the agent's total for the day, week or month stays under its limit, are confirmed without a person. Everything else waits.
• One or two people — above the amount, one approver confirms, or two different people do.

3. Nadia's restock agent, start to finish

Nadia runs the office. She installs the Restock agent from the agent templates.

1. On its first run, Restock creates a list called Office stock with sample lines (paper, toner, coffee) and tells her each line needs a vendor. It proposes nothing yet.
2. Nadia fills in the lines: the item, the minimum she wants on the shelf, what is there now, and the vendor — the vendor's party URI from the vendor list.
3. On a weekday morning, toner is below its minimum. Restock proposes one purchase from the toner's vendor, with a line item per low item.
4. The proposal appears in Your Call — ranked Urgent, because confirming it spends money, so the count beside Your Call in the sidebar turns red — and on Settings → Billing → Purchases under Open: "Pay Acme Office Supplies 212.40 USD (21,240 credits) — by hand." The agent's description is shown with any link or payment address removed; the vendor and the amount come from your list, never from the agent's text.
5. Nadia's approver confirms it. If the account has the Ledger, the expense and the payable are posted, due on the vendor's terms.
6. Nadia pays Acme as she always does and clicks Mark paid on the purchase, with the bank transfer's reference. The payment is posted and the payable is settled.
7. Acme e-mails the receipt to the agent. Because it arrives on the agent's conversation about this purchase, it is attached on its own; its fingerprint becomes the payment's evidence on the books. A receipt that only mentions the order number shows up as a file to attach with one click.
8. When the box arrives, she clicks Record delivery with Acme's order number.

If the toner is a monthly order, she clicks Make recurring on the paid purchase and sets a cap. The next time Restock proposes toner from Acme, the proposal says whether it is under that cap. She still confirms it.

E-mailing a vendor

An agent can draft an e-mail to a vendor about a purchase — a request for a quote, an order, a question about a delivery — but only to one of the vendor's contact addresses. The draft waits in Your Call (ranked Important: the agent is waiting on it); it is sent from the agent's own address when the purchase's approver, an owner or an admin confirms it, and the vendor's reply comes back to the agent's conversation about the purchase.

Comparing quotes

Create a list with the kind quote. An agent adds the quotes it collects as a proposal you confirm; the list then shows a Compare quotes table — vendor, price, terms and how long each quote is valid — cheapest first. A purchase can cite the quote it came from, and the quote's vendor must be the vendor it buys from.

Buying connect0 credits

An agent that runs low can propose buying a credit pack. An owner or admin confirms it and pays at the checkout it opens; it appears on the purchases page beside your vendor purchases.

When a purchase is refused

What the agent reads	What it means	What to do
That vendor is not on the account's list	The agent named a vendor nobody listed	Add the vendor on Settings → Billing → Limits, or ignore it
The purchase would exceed the agent's cap	One of the agent's caps is reached	Raise the cap, or confirm the purchase another way
Agent purchases are off for this account	The account switch is off	An owner turns it on on Settings → Billing → Limits
That address is not one of the vendor's vetted contact addresses	The agent tried to e-mail someone else	Add the address to the vendor's contacts if it is right