Tips to help you manage stock and to use your stock control software

One of the important steps to manage your stock is manage the core areas of movements. The events of ways that stock moves are as follows:

1. Stock is ordered from your suppliers

2. Stock is received at your store or warehouse

3. Stock is shipped out to other stores

4. Stock is shipped out to customers

5. Stock is sold directly to walk in customers

1. When it comes to good stock control you need to have tools that will help determine what stock you need to purchase. A good stock control software system will provide tools that will give you direction on what stock has hits its re-order levels and also provide you with information on stock movement. This information helps you know what to order and helps you not over stock your stores or your warehouse.

Holding stock costs you money so a good stock control software system will help reduce your stock levels aaving you money.

2. When stock is received at your store or warehouse you need procedures to ensure this stock is received in to your stock control software and that what you have received matches with what you have ordered. To acheive this you need a marked area where stock that has been delivered is kept in this area until it has been received in to your system. To receive your stock your stock control software should allow you to bring up the purchase order (PO) and then scan various items and check the quantity against what was ordered. If there is a variance between the purchase order and what has been delivered then a good stock system will force you to either create a backorder or change the purchase order to match what was received.

3. Stock is moved to other stores. The process of moving stock needs to ensure that the process of stock leaving a location and going to another is tracked. You stock control software needs to support a mechanism for internal transfers where the request for the stock is lodged and the packing, shipping and then receiving of the stock is all tracked.

4. Shipping stock to customers based on their orders. As a wholesaler or person operating an online store it is important that you are able to track all your orders and can see what has been ordered, what orders are still waiting for stock and those orders that are ready to be shipped. The packing and preparation of orders is important role where your staff need to be diligent to ensure what has been ordered has been packed. Good stock control software will provide tools including order dockets to help with the picking, some systems may also support scan packing the order so that each item in the order is scanned.

5. Sales to in store customers. What is important in this area is having mechanism to ensure customers get the stock they have want and that you bill the customer correctly. One of the areas that cost businesses money is stock that gets stolen or damaged. You store needs to have processes and your stock management sofwtare need to help control the process.

There are many more things to consider in the area of stock control software, please refer to the other articles for more details. 

How do you manage your inventory

The amount and the number of product lines can vary greatly between difference business. Some businessses in a niche market may only have 5 or 10 products where other businesses can have thousands and thousands of product lines. Regardless of the number of lines the process to secure and manage inventtory is the same. The factor that size and volume creates is that if you have inefficient processes and systems the problems are compoounded.

At the basic level how do you manage inventory?

Step 1. Inventory is ordered.

To do this you need to work out what you need to order based on the customer demand. You never get your estimate of customer demand perfect but after a period of time you can get close.  So to confirm this step again you need to order the stock that you expect customers to purchase over the next week or month depending on the shelf life of your product and also the financial cost of holding that stock.

This sound pretty easy but in reality this is where so many businesses owners spend many many hours. It is this task of ordering that is one of the most painful. If you get it wrong it can cost you a lot of money.

So what tools does inventory management software need to provide to make this tasks more accurate and efficient?

A good system will include the ability to set minimum stock levels and stock re-order quantities. The software shoudl then be able to show the user what stock has hits its re-order level with tools to quickly add these items to a purchase order.

The other things that is also important is the ability to be able to see what stock is required for sales orders that you do not currently have in stock.

The above two capabilities are the most important tools you should look for in your inventory management software from a purchase order perspective

Step 2. Receive the stock

This step is the simple process of receiving the stock. However what you need here is systems of control to ensure each pallet, crate, and box is checked against the purchase ordered so that you ensure what you have ordered has been received. If there is something missing it needs to be noted in your system and either placed on back order or the purchase order changed.

Your system is only as good as the data entered by you and your staff. if you are not disciplined then you will lose control of your inventory.

Step 3. Sale and dispatch of your orders

This is where sotck leaves your control through sales. Items thorugh the sales prcoess should be scanned to ensure accurate movement of the stock. If you are not giving the product diretly to the customer then you need dispatch procedures to manage the outgoing orders and to ensure all the stock in the order is dispatched accurately and the data recorded in the system.

Step 3. Customer returns and supplier returns

If you stock is faultly then you need to receive the stock back from the customer and then track the process of returning this to the supplier and getting a credit note. So many businesses are laxy in this area and do not have a good inventory managment software system that helps ensure they not only return the stock but get a replacement or a credit note/refund. Do not burn your money here, ensure your systems gives you the abiliyty to track on follow through on supplier returns.

Step 4. Stock adjustments and stock take

Stock will get damaged, lost and sometimes stolen so you need the ability to adjust stock levels to ensure your inventory management system is accurate. This is completed through stock adjustments and then on a larger scale a full stock take. For the stock take process you need to be able to print out your current stock list and then go through the process of counting and recording the stock levels so that the system is accurate.

Note: A good system allows you do complete partial stock takes so that you do not have to do the stock take at the one time or you can do a rolling stock take.

Step 5. Product pricing and stock reports

It is vital that you can quickly get reports on what stock is moving, what stock is not selling and what you are making money on so that you can manage your stock levels and most importantly your margins.

A couple of very important features that you find in PBSA POS is the ability to change prices via the incoming goods screen so that as you see how much you are paying for stock you can adjust the price to maintain your margin levels.

The other feature unique to PBSA POS is the ability to see an entire category of products including the stock levels, the average cost price, the last cost price and your margins with the ability to make bulk changes and individiau changes on the one screen. This re-pricing tools is so valuable and save hours upon hours not to mention boosting profits.

So in summary good inventory management software provides the tools you need to manage the above steps. PBSA POS is one inventory management software system that has additional tools that are designed to save you countless hours each week and to ensure you control your stock levels and expenses in addition to your margin levels.

What should you look for when you evaluate stock control software?

A. Easy to use comprehensive product management tools
This includes flexible pricing, category/department classification,  support for customer specific pricing and powerful re-pricing tools to make the management of your margins as simple as possible

B. Purchase order generation and management tools
Whether you have a small or large product range tools that show stock that has hit re-order levels and other stock level and purchase order integration tools are vital in a good stock control software solution.

C. Incoming goods
Ability to select the linked purchase order, support for back orders and purchase order adjustments are all important. Another great feature in the PBSAPOS stock control software solution was the ability to adjust the fixed retail price via the incoming goods screen. There also needs to be support for supplier returns.

D. Stock take and stock adjustments
As stock is lost or damaged or moved between locations you need tools to make the stock adjustments to ensure your system remains accurate.  In addition a simple to use stock take module is imperative in any good stock control software solution.

E. Stock Reports
It is imperative that you have reports on stock movement, stock sales margins, stock that needs re-ordering, stock take reports, stock that is expiring (vital for fresh produce stores) and stock that is not moving

For more details stay tuned for my later blogs and find out more about using stock control software to improve your business.