# How to award items that were not in a PO

**URL:** <https://discussions.scouting.org/t/how-to-award-items-that-were-not-in-a-po/509176>\
**Category:** Using Scoutbook & Scoutbook Plus\
**Tags:** advancement\
**Created:** [January 12, 2026, 7:46pm UTC](https://discussions.scouting.org/t/how-to-award-items-that-were-not-in-a-po/509176 "2026-01-12T19:46:46Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![JulienBeasley](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/scouting/user_avatar/discussions.scouting.org/julienbeasley/32/33534_2.png) [@JulienBeasley](https://discussions.scouting.org/u/JulienBeasley)\
**Post date:** [January 12, 2026, 7:46pm UTC](https://discussions.scouting.org/t/how-to-award-items-that-were-not-in-a-po/509176/1 "2026-01-12T19:46:46Z")

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Hello all,

I am the new advancement chair for my pack. We have some advancements from prior years that were never awarded, as well as some that were bough in person at our scout shop. We want to award these to our cub scouts before buying new ones. The problem is that our den leaders cannot award these items since they aren’t tied to a PO. It looks like scoutbook plus is only letting den leaders award items that were marked as “purchased” through the PO system.

How do we get around this? We certainly don’t want to buy these advancements again when we already have them.

Thank you!

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**Author:** ![Stephen\_Hornak](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/scouting/user_avatar/discussions.scouting.org/stephen_hornak/32/16282_2.png) [@Stephen\_Hornak](https://discussions.scouting.org/u/Stephen_Hornak)\
**Post date:** [January 12, 2026, 8:19pm UTC](https://discussions.scouting.org/t/how-to-award-items-that-were-not-in-a-po/509176/2 "2026-01-12T20:19:42Z")

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@JulienBeasley- create a po for the items on hand then close it. Did any one else try to mark them as awarded

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**Author:** ![JulienBeasley](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/scouting/user_avatar/discussions.scouting.org/julienbeasley/32/33534_2.png) [@JulienBeasley](https://discussions.scouting.org/u/JulienBeasley)\
**Post date:** [January 12, 2026, 8:31pm UTC](https://discussions.scouting.org/t/how-to-award-items-that-were-not-in-a-po/509176/3 "2026-01-12T20:31:25Z")

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Thank you, I will try that!

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**Author:** ![Stephen\_Hornak](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/scouting/user_avatar/discussions.scouting.org/stephen_hornak/32/16282_2.png) [@Stephen\_Hornak](https://discussions.scouting.org/u/Stephen_Hornak)\
**Post date:** [January 12, 2026, 8:33pm UTC](https://discussions.scouting.org/t/how-to-award-items-that-were-not-in-a-po/509176/4 "2026-01-12T20:33:18Z")

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@JulienBeasley- i have done that many times. The po does nothing other than create a shopping list

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**Author:** ![edavignon](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/scouting/user_avatar/discussions.scouting.org/edavignon/32/16_2.png) [@edavignon](https://discussions.scouting.org/u/edavignon)\
**Post date:** [January 12, 2026, 11:46pm UTC](https://discussions.scouting.org/t/how-to-award-items-that-were-not-in-a-po/509176/5 "2026-01-12T23:46:55Z")

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@JulienBeasley

Please provide the Scouting America Member ID (no names) and awards you can’t mark awarded. We would like the developers to investigate.

Are you getting an error when you try to mark an award that is not on a PO awarded?

Please do not attempt to add these awards to a PO until you hear back.

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**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/scouting/original/1X/66e9612584db5dbf76de17f00ad877998c0ba3d6.png) [@system](https://discussions.scouting.org/u/system)\
**Post date:** [January 19, 2026, 11:47pm UTC](https://discussions.scouting.org/t/how-to-award-items-that-were-not-in-a-po/509176/6 "2026-01-19T23:47:25Z")

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