Release Management

Overview

This process document will go into detail about how the Release Management functionality works.. The below sections will cover how to; Force Out material, Merge Shippers, and how to “Steal” allocated stock from an order(s) to allocate to another one.

Force Out

Force out is a term that allows you to “force out” (remove) stock items that are allocated when an order has been converted. Force out is typically used when “order holds” are used.

Savance Enterprise has several types of holds:

• Pack and Hold

• Reserve Hold

• Order Hold

• Line Item Hold

• Ship Complete

“Force Out” comes in handy for cherry-picking for partial shipment, and potentially a backorder situation, or when you have a ship complete and the customer needs some of the material now.

Forcing out already allocated stock will create additional shippers each time the process happens. The below sub-sections will go over how each ‘Force Out’ functionally works.

Force Out Allocated and not Released

The typical use case for this functionality is when you have a ship complete. When an order is marked ship complete within Savance it means that the order will not create a release/pick-ticket until everything for that order is available.

So for example, if you have an order with 5 line items with various quantities and you use the order level Ship Complete feature, you should only expect a release/shipper to be created and a pick ticket to print when all the items for all the lines are available on hand. As the items become available you can choose at the receiving level to allocate to this order via Process Backorders.

• In my example below. I created an order with 2 lines that are both out of stock and marked it Ship Complete in the header.

• When the order is converted, it does not create a release nor print a pick ticket.

  

• You will now see on the original order that the quantity is now shown under the column SCAllocated and no shipper has been created yet.

  

• Now if you have a scenario in which this customer wants some of the material now you can select ‘Force Out Only and Not Released’ for some of the allocated material while you wait for the rest of the items to become available.

• In the Release Management screen, you will see the Ship Complete Allocated column reflect what you have already allocated.

  

• Enter the quantity of stock you want to ‘Force out” of allocation by entering that quantity in the ‘Quantity to Release’ Column.

  

• Next, you can either line by line select ‘Take/Force’ or for a larger order you can select the ‘Force Out Only Allocated and No Released’ button

  

• You will see the items listed below that will be added to a shipper and quantity. Once satisfied select the Allocate Shipper button.

  

• A release will be created and a pick ticket will print for only those items that you force out.

  

• While the rest of the items and quantities remain on Not Released

  

Force Out Available Only

This feature can work for many different scenarios. A common scenario for this is if there are any holds on the order and the customer either wants to release the entire order or cherry-pick from the order.

Regardless of the hold type selected (except for Ship Complete) when the order is converted a release will happen, a shipper is created and a pick ticket will be created.

• For this example, I created an order with 3 lines of all available items and marked it Pack and Hold in the header. My customer at the time didn’t want the order to be shipped right away so our warehouse will process, pick, pack, and hold the shipment until given the ok from the customer.

  

• When the order is converted, it will create a shipper and a pick-ticket will print

  

• The goal of these holds is to physically allocate the stock by, picking, packing and holding until the customer is ready for shipment.

• Now in the scenario in which the customer wants some of the quantity you already allocated to this order now. You can ‘Force Out Available Only’’

• Open the order and go to Status tab to open the Shipper.

  

• Select the line or lines you want to ship now by right-clicking on the line and selecting” unrelease line”

  

• Next enter the amount you want to release by subtracting the quantity

  

• So, for example, I want 75 shipped now. I will enter 125 to still keep allocated to the order. NOTE: 200 is allocated, I still want to hold 125 so I will release (un-allocate) 75.

  

• After you unreleased your lines and quantities select “ Save and Close”

• The order will now reflect these changes on the line item grid.

  

• Now within the ‘Status’ tab select ‘Release Management’

  

• The screen will reflect the “Not Release” 75, and the Shipper with all the materials that we are currently holding for shipment.

  

• Next select ‘ Force Out Available Only’ and a Shipper to Allocate will be created.

  

• Finally select ‘Allocate Shipper’ and another shipper will be created that you can ship that adjusted quantity from.

• The rest of the order will remain on hold until the customer is ready for shipment.

Force Out Available and Stock Adjust Remaining

This feature will allow you to Force Out material as well as stock adjust your inventory all in one step. There are times the inventory may not be correct, and could potentially hold up a backorder or ship complete order. This next section will go over how to use this functionality.

• For example I have created an order that is partially available. Quantity 6 is available and my customer wants 10.

• Once the order is converted, a shipper and pick ticket was created for the 6 available quantity.

  

• Upon picking up the order, the warehouse discovers that you have all 10 available. To create a shipper for those additional 6, open the order and select Release Management in the Status tab.

• The Release Management screen will reflect the original shipper created for 6, and the Not Released for the remaining balance of 4.

• Since you want to ship the entire order, select ‘Force Out Available and Stock Adjust Remaining’.

• In the Shipper to Allocate the remaining balance will appear with a warning message that you will also be stock adjusting the 7.

  

• Select Accept and then Allocate Shipper.

• Since you are doing a Stock Adjustment, you will need to select a reason for why before you can proceed.

  

• Once completed another shipper will appear in the Status tab of the order.

  

“Stealing” Stock from other Orders

There are times that you have a customer that needs material right away, and you know you have the stock but it is tied to orders where the other customer is not in a rush to receive it because the have it on some hold or ship complete.. Savance has the functionality to “steal” stock from other orders.

• In the example below a customer places an order for material that is out of stock. They need it now, and can’t wait for more to be ordered and received. You know you have a customer that has these items allocated to them for an order you are holding and is also waiting for other materials to arrive.

• After the order is converted, it is now a backorder, and no Shipper or Pick Ticket is generated.

  

• To steal stock within the Status tab of the order select ‘Release Management’.

  

• On the right-hand side select Take/Force

  

• Next select Search Other Orders for Material. If there are any orders available that you can steal quantities from they will appear.

  

• You’ll next have the option to steal from stock allocated on a Ship Complete, Reserved Hold, Shipper Allocated, or Kit Allocated.

• Next Select the amount you want to steal from one or multiple orders and select ‘Accept’

• The Release Management screen will show you what orders are affected, and what will be allocated to your shipper.

  

• Select Allocate Shipper and one will be created for the order, which can be viewed on the Status tab within the order.

  

Print Pick Ticket Options

• Reprint Pick Tickets for Modified Orders

• Reprint Pakaging Lists for Modified Orders

NOTE: Upon modifying stolen from Shippers, may need to reprint their pick ticket and/or packaging list - confirm discarding previously printed pick ticket and/or packaging list before modification

• New Shippers - Print Pick Ticket for the newly Created Shipper

• PT Printer Dropdown

Merge Releases

In several scenarios above orders are left with multiple shippers. This can be cumbersome especially to the customer when billing occurs and to the warehouse when having to pick, pack, and ship orders. To alleviate these situations Savance has the ability to ‘Merge Releases’.

Merging Releases allows you to combine several shippers into one final shipper.

• In the example below we have an order with 2 shippers because we found additional stock in the warehouse for an order that was short. In that scenario, we Force Out Available and Stock Adjusted the Remaining to care for the customer's needs.

  

• Instead of having 2 shippers and 2 Invoices I am going to Merge both the -00 and 01 orders to create one final shipper and invoice.

• Within the order select ‘Release Management

  

• You will see the Shipper -00 and Shipper -01 listed. On the right-hand side, select ‘Merge All’

  

• This will combine the multiple shippers into one order and list it under Shipper To Allocate Details.

  

• As you can see it will let you know what shippers are being merged, under Merged from Shippers

  

• Next select, Allocate Shipper

  

• Both the -00 and -01 have been canceled and a brand new 02 has been created combing the entire shippers that were merged.

  

New Features Version 10.x

Overcommit Inventory

• Given that you have an order and do not have enough available inventory to allocate a shipper, and you do NOT want to make an inventory adjustment to satisfy the qty.

• Open the Release Management screen on the order and click “Take/Force” for the line you need to overcommit.

• Click “Remaining” to allocate the qty and click Accept.

• Back on the release management screen, the “Shipper to Allocate Details” section of the screen shows what line/s will be allocated and if there will be a Stock Adjustment

• If necessary, release the rest of the line items that need to be in the shipper.

Normally, the next step will be to click Allocate Shipper, and a stock adjustment reason screen will appear. Overcommitting will bypass this step and let inventory go negative/further negative.

• Check the Overcommit box at the bottom of the screen.

• Then click Allocate Shipper. Note that inventory has not been adjusted and has not changed (negative) yet. Only the qty allocated (positive) will show.

• Process the shipper.

• Once you have posted the shipper to either Loaded or Delivered, the qty on hand will go negative by that much more.

Reporting

• You can use the Item Stock Report to see what items have been forced to go negative.

• In the parameters screen for the report, set it to show items with negative on hand (in this example it only shows negatives).

These negative quantities should be addressed to help make counting as smooth as possible. Either fixing them by doing stock adjustments or receiving and putting away corresponding POs.

Columns Added to Release Management - Comment fields from Order Grid.

Navigate to Settings > Spreadsheet Admin see Spreadsheet Admin Settings - Process

• For defined name of comment fields please read from spreadsheet admin. This is where “Show Column” will display comment fields called Comment1, Comment2, Comment3, and Comment4 on the Order Grid

• These columns can be renamed and repositioned here and saved for use on grid.

**
Columns Added to Release Management - Comment fields from Order grid.**

• Select Status tab on Order

• Select Release Management

• Not Released mode

• Right click > column chooser

• Add a comment field as shown and as defined on order entry grid

• Dragging and dropping in place on header.

• And it displays as named it

• And it shows comment text

• When right click on Qty to release column header

• “Hide this Column” option is disabled

• When right click on “Action” column header

• “Hide this Column” option is disabled

• Rearrange columns and size of columns as needed

• Do this on other grids in screen

• When ready will exit release management screen

• Then later once some items are released

  • Either manually in release management or by receiving some items

• Open release management screen again

• In Released Mode, under Shipper headers

• Columns are still arranged.

• Columns hid and/or added display accordingly

• When ready close screen

• Pull up a different order

• Select Release Management screen

• The columns are still arranged as previously arranged.

• And columns hid and/or added display accordingly

• Disable “Hide This Column” option when you right click on “Qty to Release” column and “Action” column.

• The default columns that should be following:

  • Line #

  • MFG

  • Part Number

  • Stored Shipper #

  • Description

  • Install Location

  • Product Type

  • Qty

  • Qty Shipped

  • Allocated to Other Shippers

  • Reserved Hold Allocated

  • Ship Complete Allocated

  • Quantity Available

  • Quantity to release

  • Remaining/ Orig. Remaining

  • Stock Adj

  • Action