If you keep inventory at a customer's location, and you do not bill the customer until they use that inventory, you should set up a consignment warehouse. You can then consign merchandise in the Customer Consignment warehouse and replenish those quantities through Stock Transfers.
Example: For example, suppose you have placed 5 items with the customer. You would then perform a stock transfer from your inventory to the customer's consignment warehouse.
Later, during your salesperson customer visit, the salesperson counts only 3 items in the products inventory. At that point, the salesperson will invoice the customer for two items, and set up a stock transfer for two more items into inventory.
If you run any of your business as consignment, consider using Inform ERP's QuickOrder component, which can help count and sort automatically through scanning.
First, configure the consignment warehouse
- Go to File > Company > Warehouse.
- Create a new warehouse or open an existing warehouse that you want to convert to a consignment.
- Click Edit.
- From the Warehouse Type list, choose Consign to Customer.
- In the Consign to Customer Options Customer box, type or select the customer to whom the merchandise is consigned.
- In the Consign Whse box, type or select the warehouse from which the consignment warehouse will be replenished.
- Click Save.
- Specify which products will be kept in the consignment warehouse with the minimum quantity that should be maintained in the warehouse.
Note that you can also set these minimum levels from the customer configuration–see Set up a consignment warehouse for a customer; and all the way down to the ship to location level–see Configure minimum and maximum stock levels per ship to.
- Re-open the warehouse.
- Click the Consignment tab.
- Click Add Consignment Product. A new row appears in the Consignment Product grid.
- In the Product column, type or search for the item you want to consign, and then press the Tab key.
- Type the minimum and maximum quantities to hold in stock in the Min Quantity and Max Quantity boxes.
- Click Save.
Then create a stock transfer to fill the initial quantities
- Select Inventory > Stock Transfer > Stock Transfer Entry.
- Click New.
- In the From Warehouse box, type or search for the replenishment warehouse.
- In the To Warehouse box, type the Customer Consignment warehouse you created in the last procedure.
- Type your Initials in the box provided. .
- Click the Customer Consignment Replenishment button, and then click OK on the confirmation message that appears. Inform ERP generates a list of products and quantities that the system recommends you transfer.
- Review the system's recommendations and make any necessary changes.
- Click Save. Inform ERP saves the transfer entry and assigns a reference number to it in the Transfer No. field. You can now print the transfer by clicking the Print button.
Tip: To check the status of the transfer, open the Stock Transfer Entry screen, and type the reference code in the Transfer No. field and press Tab.
Create sales orders for sold consignment inventory
When you sell to the customer, you will need to change the Warehouse on the order to pull the inventory quantities from the consignment warehouse.
Replenish the warehouse.
Follow the same procedure as you did for stocking the initial quantities: In the Stock Transfer screen, when creating a new transfer click the Customer Consignment Replenishment button.