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Buyer IDs in Dynamics GP: A Small Field That Can Do a Lot

If you’ve ever entered a purchase order in Dynamics GP, you’ve probably glanced at the Buyer ID field and moved on. Most teams treat it as a “who owns this PO?” tag and call it a day. But here’s something a lot of GP users don’t realize: the Buyer ID doesn’t have to be tied to an actual GP user at all.

That little field is a lot more flexible than it looks. You can use it to group POs by department, location, product line, division, project, region—pretty much any way of slicing your purchasing activity that makes sense for how your business actually runs. And once you start thinking about it that way, it becomes a surprisingly useful reporting dimension.

Why this still matters in 2025

Plenty of organizations are still running Dynamics GP today, even as Microsoft has shifted its focus to Dynamics 365 Business Central. If you’re in that group—whether you’re staying on GP for the foreseeable future or quietly evaluating a move—getting more value out of the data you already capture is one of the easiest wins available. Buyer IDs are a perfect example: no customization, no add-on, just a smarter use of a field that’s already there.

(And if you are thinking about what’s next after GP, the way you’ve structured Buyer IDs, departments, and other reference data is exactly the kind of thing worth mapping out before a migration conversation. More on that at the end.)

How to set up non-user Buyer IDs

Let’s walk through a common example: tagging each PO with the department that requested it, so we can report on purchasing activity by department later.

First, set up the departments as Buyer IDs:

  1. Go to Cards >> Purchasing >> Buyers.

  2. Type a Buyer ID—in this case, a department name. When you tab out of the field, GP will warn you that the ID isn’t an existing user. That’s fine.

  3. Click New Buyer to add it as a non-user Buyer ID.

  4. Enter a description so it’s clear to anyone using the lookup later.

  5. Click Insert to add it to the Buyer ID list.

  6. Repeat for each department, then click OK.

Using Buyer IDs on a PO

Now the new IDs are available wherever Buyer ID shows up in GP:

  1. Go to Transactions >> Purchasing >> Purchase Order Entry.

  2. Tab to the Buyer ID field and click the lookup icon (or press Ctrl+L).

  3. You’ll see your departments right alongside any user-based Buyer IDs.

  4. Pick the right one and finish the PO as usual.

Getting the data back out

Capturing the data is only half the point—you want to see it in reports.

  • SmartList: Add the Buyer ID column to any Purchase Order or Purchase Line Items SmartList. Sort, filter, or group by it the same way you would any other field.

  • Built-in PO reports: Most of the standard Purchase Order reports let you restrict by Buyer ID, so you can pull a clean view for a single department or a defined range.

  • SSRS, Power BI, Crystal, or your tool of choice: Buyer ID is just another field in the underlying tables, so it’s available anywhere you build custom reports or dashboards.

A quick word on what comes next

Tips like this are great for squeezing more value out of GP today, but they also tend to surface a bigger question: is our ERP actually keeping up with how we run the business? If you’re finding that you’re working around GP more than working with it—or you’re starting to think about Business Central, a cloud ERP, or another path forward—that’s a conversation worth having before it becomes urgent.

At eIS Business Solutions, we help finance and operations leaders evaluate their ERP strategy and align their financial systems with the platforms that actually run the business. If you’d like a hand—either getting more out of GP or figuring out what’s next—reach out and let’s talk.