Difference between revisions of "Inventory Counting"

Revision as of 17:14, 5 August 2019

Inventory counts can be sped up considerably using HandiFox, especially when barcoding is involved. More than that, counting can be parallelized by having multiple employees count different parts of your stock with their mobile devices.

Counting Inventory in the Web App

To start counting inventory in the web app, go to Inventory → Counting Sessions and click .

A new counting session in the web app

You can add items to the counting session by selecting them from a list, scanning them in (use the Scan Barcode field) or combining these two methods (scanning an item once to find it and then editing the new quantity).

You can also check the Show All Items checkbox to show all your inventory parts in this counting session. Then you can browse and enter new quantities only for the items you have counted.

If you need to count your entire inventory (on the given site), use the Full Inventory Count option. It will add all your items to the counting session and set all their quantities to zero, meaning that if you haven't counted some item, then it is not there.

You can change the site on which you are counting inventory by selecting a new site from the Inventory Site dropdown.

You can optionally set a reference number for this counting session in the corresponding field, and edit the Memo field for any notes you wish to include for the rest of your team or for history.

Finally, you can search among items already added to the counting session, using the search field in the upper part of the page. Search is possible by item names, descriptions and SKUs.

When you are finished, or if you need to take a break, click Save to record the counting session in its current state.

Saving your counting session will not modify any quantities on hand just yet. You can go back later and add some more items to it.

To finalize your counting session, find it on the Counting Sessions page and click on it to view. Depending on your company settings and your own permissions in the system, you can either click Submit to Review, so a manager can review and approve your counts, or Apply your counting session right away. In the latter case your new counts will take effect immediately.

Counting Inventory in the Mobile App

Inventory Counting Screen of the Mobile App

To start counting inventory, go to Inventory → Inventory Counting. You will see a list of all your items that can be counted. You can count items by scanning, finding them on the list and typing in new quantities, or combining these two methods (scanning an item once to find it and then editing the new quantity).

If you have over 5000 items, this screen will not list all of them and will work as a lookup instead. In this case using a barcode scanner is highly recommended, since finding items by filtering can take a long time.

A reference number can be specified for a counting session in the Ref. No. field, but it is not required.

You can Save your counting session if you need to leave it and continue later.

If you wish to discard the counts you have entered so far and start over, you can tap Clear.

To force a full inventory count, mark the Complete Inventory Counting checkbox. This will reset the quantities for every single item to zero, unless you enter a new count for it.

When you have finished with all the items you needed to count, tap Apply to finalize and submit your counting session. After that, it will be sent for manager approval.

After a counting session has been applied, a new one cannot be started right away. The existing counting session has to be approved/refused by a manager in the web app, and the mobile app has to learn about this status change through synchronizing before a new counting session can be started.

Printing out Inventory Counting Results

In the web app

First, go to Inventory → Counting Sessions and find the counting session that interests you (possibly using search and filtering). Click on the counting session to view it, then on the next page click Print.

In the mobile app

In the mobile app, you can print the results of a counting session by tapping Print on the Inventory Counting screen at any time. Printing is possible for a counting session in progress as well as one that has already been Applied (as long as it can still be viewed on the device).

Inventory Count Review and Approval

By default, HandiFox demands that all new inventory counts done on mobile devices or in the web app are reviewed and accepted by a manager before they take effect.

This behavior can be disabled under → Settings → Inventory → Manager Approval is Required. In this case all counting sessions will take effect immediately after they are applied.

Counting sessions pending approval will be listed in the web app, under Inventory → Counting Sessions (and also in the Dashboard). By default, counting sessions for all inventory sites are displayed, but they can be filtered for a specific site.

A newly submitted counting session being listed on the Counting Sessions page

To start reviewing counting results, mark one or more counting sessions using the checkboxes in the leftmost column, then click View. You will see the items counted in all sessions you marked with their old and new counts.

Viewing the results of a newly submitted counting session

If the same item was counted more than once (on different devices), all the counts will be added up in this list (provided that you are reviewing all the counting sessions together).

Use the checkboxes to mark all item rows that you want to take effect, then click Apply. All other rows will be discarded!

You can also discard a counting session completely by marking it on the Counting Sessions page and clicking Void.