Introduction

Stock Items are the general name we give to items we regularly sell or bring up on an invoice. 


Within the Stock Item menu you can add new items and part numbers, edit or delete existing ones, perform bulk maintenance tasks and stock takes, print bar-code labels and view item history..

Within Items you can see details on Price Books, Categories, Actions, Attributes, Equivalent items and more.


Stock Item Types

Each stock items has a Type set which controls how the item is created and used. The main types are:

  • STANDARD - Normal items that do not have serial numbers 
  • MESSAGE - Useful way to display text or a message by selecting an Item Number
  • UNIT (NEW) - New Units with details such as Serial number and Job tracking
  • UNIT (USED) - Used Units with details such as Serial number and Job tracking
  • VARIANT - For grouping a range of items such as clothing of different sizes - Also called Fashion Matrix
  • GIFTCARD - For Store, Loyalty and Gift cards or vouchers


Key information for each Stock Item

On the main stock item screen the information on the left hand side is normally the most common information we would have for each stock item such as:

  • Lookup No - This is our main lookup number or code (See Item Numbers for detailed info and tips)
  • Description - The description that is printed on Invoices, purchase order etc 
  • Prices and Margin - The average Cost, the base Sell (can be changed with price levels) and Margin (can auto calculate).
  • Tax Code - The tax rate that normally applies to the item
  • Category - How we categorise the stock for internal analysis, also used to search 
  • Brand - We can set the Brand if we require further analysis. 
  • Location - The location or bin where the part is stored
  • Label format - You can set a different label format depending on the Item eg: Bar-code only, With Price, No Label
  • Long Description - For use on Web sites etc
  • Notes - Internal notes on the stock item


On the right side there are various tabs with additional information such as:

  • Inventory - Quantities, Stock count details, Extra prices, and stock flags such as Active, Update stock, Website etc.
  • General - Up to 6 pictures, Delivery details, Commission details, Type code
  • Suppliers - You can set a supplier record for each supplier with Supplier number, Last cost and supply Pack qty
  • Actions - Kits, Tag-along items, Related items etc
  • Attributes - Unlimited user defined additional fields for a stock item
  • Fitments - Can show which models a certain part can fit
  • Alternate / Linked Numbers - Alternate = Multiple numbers for same item. Linked (Related / Equivalent) = Multiple items for same number
  • History - Shows details of each time an item is purchased and sold


Notes on Alternate / Linked items

If you have multiple numbers relating to a single stock item you should use:

  • Alternate Numbers 
  • Supplier Numbers
  • Bar-code number 


If you have multiple stock items that are linked you can use one of the following features:

  • Linked numbers (Related / Equivalent) - If there is stock of the number entered it will just sell it, although you can select Edit and then Equivalent to show the linked items 
  • Actions (Related Items) - This will show the linked items every time a number is entered
  • Superseded Number - If there is stock of the number entered it will just sell it, although you can select Edit and then Supersede to show the linked items 

All of the above only work on the Sales screen. 


See: Item Numbers  for more information


Stock Control

Knowing exactly what stock you are holding is important for many reasons including:

  • To avoid missing sales by having insufficient stock because they were not automatically re-ordered
  • To avoid over-stocking by reordering when you already have some
  • To see how well your business is performing (you cannot work out your Gross or Net Profit without knowing your stock value
The fundamentals of stock movements is that stock is increased as it is received it into stock, and reduced as it is sold. 

The main trick is to know what is moving (gaining in popularity) and what is not (becoming less popular). Then you can avoid ordering more than you need, yet not run out of common items.


Normally the most efficient way of controlling what to order is to run the Maintenance option to Bulk Edit Min Qty based on sales History. This shows the sales trends and automatically suggests a minimum quantity based on sales and the amount and the weeks of stock you want to keep. You can always overwrite the suggestion on certain products when required. This is normally better than adjusting on a Purchase Order as the Maintenance can be treated as a stock management process and should be performed by staff who realise the importance of good stock control, where the Purchase Orders normally need to be produced more regularly and can then be performed by any staff.


Counting your stock

It is important to have a system to check that your stock figures on the computer are the same as the physical stock you are actually holding.

Please see Stock Count.


Reasons your stock may be out

Stock figures can be out for many reasons and it can help if you can pick up on any in-inaccuracies quickly, eg; by doing regular rotating stock counts for sections of stock.


Common reasons for stock being out include:

  • Inadvertently processing a different item - It is not uncommon to process say an XL item of clothing where it is actually an XXL. Items may have been un-boxed to look at and then put back into the wrong box. Customers have even been known to swap price tickets to get at a lower price. The problem with this is that normally 2 records are affected (one is too high and one is too low)
  • Items not invoiced correctly – An engineer or parts person in a hurry or being unable to find the correct part number
  • Theft by customers – This is hard to cut out completely, but at least with stock counting you know where and when it is happening you can address it better
  • Theft by staff – Nobody wants this to happen, but it is much more likely to happen if you do not have a system that identifies problem areas
  • Items not being entered into stock correctly – You may have just have received a delivery for an item a customer wants and it is sold from the box and then not entering into stock. You can normally control this by matching a Goods Received Note to every Purchase Invoice for stock.
  • Handling Customer Orders and Price Books in-correctly - Customer orders should not adjust stock when sold or received. If an item is sold as a Special order or from a Price Book and then received as a stock part then the stock will be too high.

You would normally adjust cases 1, 2 , 3 and 4 by making a Sale adjustment. For example on the reason: ‘Inadvertently processing a different item’ the sales will be out as the sales of one item will be too much and the sales of the other item will be too little.


If there is a value on the Adjustment sale that we are nor receiving we would normally create an Internal sales transaction, which means it is not included in your accounts and no tax is assigned. When looking at Sales, reports can be configured to show Internal Sales, Normal Sales or Both. The system will use the same run of transaction numbers but this is on purpose to give us a total audit trail. Tax authorities approve of this system so long as the internal transactions can be identified.


You would normally adjust cases: 5 and 6 as a Purchase Order adjustment (Positive figure to put into stock, Negative figure to put into stock but putting the supplier as Internal Stock Adjustment).

You can also adjust single items by clicking on the button next to the Qty In Stores field. When you adjust the stock on a Stock screen it will adjust it as a Purchase Order.

For Damaged / Returned stock it is also possible to create a Returns Store and use the Transfer mode to transfer between stores.


Adjusting your stock

The stock can be adjusted in the following ways that are recorded

  • In Sales
  • In Items / Orders (receiving Purchase Orders)
  • In Items / Transfers (receiving Transfers)
  • In Stock Count (By Updating a stock Count)
  • On the Stock Browse screen using the Stock adjustment option
  • The stock can also be adjusted in ways that are not recorded
  • In Items / Stock / Maintenance (eg: Using Bulk Edit / Change Stock Qty)
  • On the Stock Browse screen using the No Stock adjustment option
  • Directly updated in the database

You would use the Bulk Editing when you need to adjust the quantity without creating an adjustment record. If the history is wrong, for example if the Opening stock was 0, purchases were 2, sales were 1, but the current stock was 0 where it should be 1, then we could not do a stock adjustment as this would be added to the history and it would not calculate back correctly.


Adjusting the stock based on movement history

Evopos can adjust or calculate stock based on history information. There are options to:


  • Adjust the Opening stock based on the Current stock and the history
  • Adjust the Current stock based on the Opening stock and the history
  • Adjusting the Opening stock takes the Current stock and then works out the stock movements from the history to calculate the Year opening stock qty. The Current stock needs to be correct.
  • Adjusting the Current stock takes the Year Opening stock and then works out the stock movements from the history to calculate the Current stock qty. Note: This updates the Counted Qty rather than the Current stock qty, so you will need to run the Reset Counted Qty to zero before running and use the Stock Count Update option to update the qty when you are sure the Counted Qty is correct


Year End

The Year End procedure in Accounts / Maintenance should be run before processing the first transaction for the new financial year.

Please see Year End