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SUP086 – Inventory Integration & Negative Quantity On Hand Updates

Inventory Integration Methods

Palladium has the ability to integrate to the General Ledger on either a Perpetual (Integrated) or on a Periodic (non-Integrated) method. Note that the system will allow you to switch from one method to another as required.

Perpetual Method
The Perpetual, or integrated method, will post a general ledger entry for the Cost of Sales/Inventory leg of a sales transaction, ensuring that the Inventory control account is updated with the correct value of the inventory on hand on a real-time basis.

Periodic Method
The Periodic, or non-integrated method, does not write any transactions to the inventory or cost of sales accounts at time of sale and relies on the user to post the correct general ledger journal entries at period, or month-end. In addition to this, no general ledger transactions are written for Inventory Adjustments or Stock Take processes.

Setup

The setup methods are the same with the use of Account sets, although the main difference is that with the Periodic Method, Palladium will only use the Revenue account for Sales, and the Expense accounts (Cost of Goods) for Purchases. The reason for this is because we require control accounts for month end Journals and related account balancing.

Data Integrity

Certain functionality has been set as inactive using the Periodic method. These include the Inventory Ledger Validations as seen below as well as the Inventory Balance in the Company Summary tab.


You will also see that we have set the Inventory Balance as Periodic Inventory Balance to simplify the identification thereof.

Negative Inventory

General
We have the ability to record negative on-hand inventory updates either using the items last received cost or to update at zero cost.

Update at Zero Cost
Updating at zero cost will value all inventory with a negative value at Zero and a value only being recorded for all quantities exceeding 0.

Example
Should you have a negative quantity of say 3 of item X and receive 5 at $100 each, Palladium will receive 3 at $0, and 2 at $100 each, with the balance of the $300 being allocated to that items Variance account as set on the Account sets.

Update at Last Received Cost
Updating at last received cost will record all negative quantity items at the prevailing last received cost per unit. When the items are sold they will be sold at the last received cost. When items are received, the items will be received at the average negative cost, with the balance between this and the Received cost being allocated to the Variance Account as set on the Item Account Set.

Example
Should we have a negative quantity of say 3 of item X where the prevailing last received cost was $200 each, showing a value of -$600, and receive 5 at $100 each, Palladium will receive 3 at $200, and 2 at $100 each, with the balance of the $200 being allocated to the Item’s Variance Account.

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SUP040 – Related Items and Upselling

This feature allows you to set an unlimited number of “Upsell” Items for Optional Dynamic Prompting per processing document. Additionally, this feature can be used to group a number of items together say in the form of Kits or Standard Orders by attaching an unlimited number of Inventory Items to a service Item as an example.

How Does This Feature Help Your Business?

  1. Provides you with extensive sales-related information, which optimises the sales process.
  2. Increases staff productivity as it limits training requirements.
  3. Reduces processing errors and makes it simple for new employees to sell specialised products.
  4. Can also be used to Relate items to others such as Item Supersession.

Setup

To illustrate this functionality, I will use an Outdoor Retail Store as an example. To get started I go to the Inventory Module | Inventory & Services and select the Primary Item that you would like to link the Related Items to. Then select the Related Items tab, and select the items that you would like to link to the primary Item. There are two primary settings here. They are as follows:

  • Qty and use Proportionate Quantity – this setting will allow you to change the ratio of Primary Items to the Related Items. An example for this would be that you may require 2x Battery Packs for every 1 x Torch sold.
  • Auto-Invoke Reminder(as signified by the checkboxes) – when selected, the system will prompt, or auto-invoke the user to purchase the respective related item as soon as the Primary item is selected for the respective processing function such as Sales Invoices or even Point of Sale.

Note
You can still view the related items on sales documents at any stage without setting them as “auto-invoke” as detailed below.

Processing

To use the function generates a sales document and select the Primary/Linked Item. There are 2 ways in which we can access and select the Related Items from the various Sales Items, either as an Auto-Invoke or a Manual Selection as detailed below.

Auto-Invoke

In the example above we have set the Sleeping Bag as the Primary Item, and have set the Flashlight and Suntan Lotion as Auto-Invoke Items. On selecting the Sleeping Bag, you will see that the system automatically prompts to add the related Items.

Manual Invoking

We can manually invoke the Related Items at any time by selecting the Related Items Button on the sales form that will allow you to select the required related items.

The screen below shows my Master Item () and Related Items (sleeping bag, gumboots, lantern, tent, etc).

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SUP044 – Understanding Freehand Quotes

This feature allows you to create Quotes for Clients (and prospective Clients alike) while managing the margins of sales and service items (including prospective items). Additionally, the Purchase and Sales Documents can be created on the fly, all from the same screen, offering traceability from the purchase of the item, to goods receiving through to the sale of the item.

How Does This Feature Help Your Business?

  • Create quotes for Prospective Clients without having to Create a Customer Masterfile Record.
  • Create quotes for Prospective Items without having to Create an Inventory Masterfile Record or use the function to control Buyouts.
  • View and manage margins as a value or as a % of the total deal value
  • On acceptance, have the ability to create the Inventory Items and Customer Records on-the-fly
  • Create the Sales and Purchase Documents all from the same screen
  • Have the option to view all Suppliers for a specific item, with the system selecting the preferred Supplier as default

Feature Options

Create a Quotation for a Prospective Customer or Prospective Inventory Item
Here you can create a quotation for a prospective OR a current customer, as well as a prospective OR current Inventory or Service Item. This allows you the ability to handle Buyouts whilst maintaining the appropriate margins. If you refer to the Vendor Field on the Item Line, you can also specify the details of the Vendor that
was used to cost the quote. (Note that in the case of standard Inventory Items, the system will default the preferred Vendor for that Item and give you the ability to select another or assign a Vendor to that Item.


Converting the Quotation
Once the Customer has approved the quote, we can now convert the details to a Sales Document (Quote, Order or Invoice) as well to one or more Purchase Documents (Requisition, Order or Supplier Invoice) on-the-fly. If you have used a prospective Customer Or Item, the system will prompt you to select the Item or Customer or to
Create these on the fly.


Once the Items and Customer has been linked the system will create the Purchase Order on-the-fly and bring through the Sales Quote and Customer Details to trace the document through to fruition.

Receive Goods With Complete Traceability
When goods are received the Created From customer and Order details will be displayed on the Goods Received Voucher and processing screen, allowing you to effectively complete the order fulfilment cycle.

Note that the ability to trace the Document Reference above is also available in all the Create/Copy Purchase Order from Sales Orders function, with each individual copied sales order and customers details listed separately.

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SUP111 – Receipts to Sales Orders and Credit Requests (Laybys)

The purpose of this feature is to allow receipts to Sales Orders and Credit Requests coupled with the ability to Send Customer Statements with or without these open orders. In addition we have the ability to process Request for Credits at time of receipting to process customer short payments or claims, alleviating the need to short allocate against a fully paid invoice. This feature is also ideal for Laybys where we will only release the goods once fully paid.

Setup

To Activate this function, go to the Company Options / Receivables – settings 2 Tab, and select the Allow Receipt Processing to Sales Orders Function.

Processing

Transaction Processing
At time of receipting we have the ability to Allocate Receipts to one or more sales orders as well as have the ability to Create a Credit Request on the fly as seen below. In my example I have Created a Sales Order for $100.

I now process a receipt against the Sales Order as seen below. Note that at this time I have the ability to process a request for Credit and on doing so the Request would also be available for allocation purposes as a negative amount. This is used extensively where client claim rebates or for returns or price changes, while still paying the other documents on the order in full.

Statement Processing
We now have the ability to process Customer Statements with or without displaying the Open Orders as seen below.

Here is a statement displaying the Open Orders

Here is an example of the statement without the Open Orders

Customer Ageing
The same applies to the Customer ageing reports per below.

With Sales Orders

Without Sales Orders

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SUP086 – Inventory Item Dimensions

In its most simplistic term, the item dimension function was designed to allow users to enter dimensions in order to calculate the quantity of an item. In addition to this, users have the ability to set default dimensions (as factors) allowing you to convert from one Unit of measure to another, on the fly.
Applications for this feature Include:

  • Entering Dimensions for Glass or Wood to calculate the m2 by entering the length and width,
  • Working with Batches or Rolls of Material or where we can enter the qty of Rolls and using a factor of say 50, default the qty to multiples thereof.
  • Invoicing boxes of items such as tiles – where we enter a required Length and Width of the area to be tiled, and together with a default Factor, the system will define the number of required boxes (ie re the example below)

Setup

Creating Profiles
The first thing we need to do is to create “profiles” or standard template settings for the dimensions. This ensures that you only need to setup a profile once, then assign it to the related items.

To setup the profile go to Inventory > Maintenance > Dimensions Profile. Once selected you will create the profile per the example below. As you see we have created 3 dimensions where the Height is a dimension that the user is unable to change. The Auto-Invoke ensures that a profile dimensions pop up to the user at time of processing.

Assign Profile to Items
Once the profiles are created you simply just assign them to the relevant Inventory items as seen below.

Sales Document Processing
Once the profiles have been assigned, the profiles will activate on all Sales and Sales Order Processing screens.

Another function is the ability to enter multiple dimension lines for the same item to be used for different glass sizes for example.

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