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Is Inventory for Me?

Lila Carsten Updated by Lila Carsten

ShopVOX has a powerful inventory feature that enables you to track inventory within your Pro account without needing to double enter data using other inventory programs or spreadsheets. Below are FAQs asked by those thinking about adding inventory now, or in the future.

If you have more questions about whether or not shopVOX Inventory add-on might meet your needs, email us at billing@shopvox.com, or if you haven't signed up for Pro yet, reach out to your sales rep.

Do I need inventory control? 

The best way to ask this question is to ask the following: What problems are you trying to solve with inventory? Is it to prevent running out of a critical material? Another good reason? If you think these will help you then yes, you'll probably benefit! But if you can get most of your inventory within a day or two from your vendor, then maybe not... 

The idea behind inventory control stated simply is knowing where important items are located and accounting for them to solve problems associated with using these items.

How can shopVOX Inventory Help Me?

I can think of couple, there are certainly more...

  • It can save you time when you are creating a PO  from a material requisition. You can check how many materials you have in stock before you actually place the order from a vendor.
  • Saves you money, hassle, stress, and hair by preventing stock outs, or worse, losing a customer. See inventory that is reserved (being used in other orders) so you don't stock out. Easily see which materials are below their ROPs so you can order them
  • Save time updating inventory in shopVOX.

How does shopVOX update inventory?

There are three ways shopVOX updates your inventory counts/levels. You can decide which products/materials you want to track inventory for.

  • Manual Update - A magical button shows up on sales orders, invoices, POs and material receipts that, when pressed, will update inventory level counts.
  • Auto Update - shopVOX can update inventory automatically when a sales order, Invoice, PO, or Material Receipt is created.
  • Manual Adjustment - This allows you to check inventory in or out of a location. You can also adjust (add or subtract) the on hand quantity to adjust inventory. All adjustments are logged, so you know who made the adjustment and when. 

One way is always available, it's called Manual Update, it requires you to push a button before inventory is actually updated. The other is Auto Update which can be turned on or off.  Although you cannot turn off the Manual Update, both Manual and Auto Update can be used simultaneously. The third way is a Manual Adjustmentwhich is managed outside of a transaction

Can I manage inventory in Quickbooks?

Yes, but you cannot sync inventory levels to or from shopVOX. (This is accomplished by setting the QB Item type to inventory item). You will need to learn how quickbooks manages inventory. Keep in mind BOM items don't sync to quickbooks, so usually you would us Quickbooks to manage "Product" inventory, not "Materials"

Can I manage inventory for apparel catalogs?

Apparel can now be tracked by the style of shirt, down to the specific size or color. So if you have 30 XS, 20 S, & 5 L of something like the Gildan 2000s, shopVOX can track just that. It is managed through custom apparel catalogs. This is particularly helpful when creating a material requisition where you can check how many units you have before you create your PO.

Does shopVOX track inventory parts and raw goods?

Yes! You can track inventory on the product level or the material level. Most shops will track on the material level. Materials are your raw goods used to create a finished good.

Does shopVOX track inventory for finished products?

Yes. Keep in mind most shops aren’t going to “stock up” on finished products; finished products are custom items only sold to one customer, so why bother, right? shopVOX can’t distinguished between a red banner and a blue banner, it just knows you have 2 banners.

Can I set up ROPs (Reorder Point)?

Yes. You can set up ROPs one by one. ROPs are set up manually by you, they cannot be created automatically.

What exactly does shopVOX Inventory track?

The following is a list of all Inventory Fields and their definitions:  

  • Location - This is where the product is located
  • Reorder Point - This is the amount that, when reached, indicates that the Material/Product should be "Re-ordered."  
  • Qty on Hand - The quantity of the Material/Product available on hand including quantities on Sales Orders.  (Qty on Hand = Qty Available + Qty Reserved) 
  • Qty Available - The quantity of the Material/Product available for new orders. 
  • Qty On PO - The quantity currently on an outstanding 'Open' PO that has not been "Received" yet. 
  • Qty Sold - The total quantity sold so far since beginning of time. 
  • Qty Reserved - The quantity "Reserved" for other Open Sales Orders.
  • Avg. Cost - What is the average cost of the Products/Materials quantities on hand. 
  • Total Value - What is the total cost of the quantities on hand.

How does shopVOX work with inventory in an sales order or inventory?

You can have inventory automatically be consumed or manually (when you tell it to), because a sales order might be changed by the customer. So if you consume a quantity of 1 ABC material and 2 of XYZ material.

What happens if I make a mistake?

If you incorrectly enter inventory data you can manually adjust the inventory to help adjust/reconcile the mistake.

Can I track inventory in other Unit of Measurements?

You can. We call this UOM "Buying Units"  it can be different than the UOM you use to sell the product to the end customer "Selling Units". For example: Let's say you sell a vinyl by the square foot but you probably buy it by the roll.

Can I track ink as inventory?

You can, but it’s probably not going to be accurate as the only thing that can accurately track ink levels is a printer. It’s useful for getting rough (sometime very rough) estimates of ink consumption so you know when it’s time to buy more to keep ink fresh.

Can I track scrap or wastage as inventory?

You cannot automatically, you would need to do this manually. You can track with precision total consumption with manual adjustments, or automatically by relying on and using the quantities provided from a product pricing template that has been applied to an order or invoice. This is usually the same quantity you are charging your customer for.

Can it handle cycle counts?

Although we don’t have a specific report called cycle count, you can easily do a cycle count from smartphone or tablet.

Can it do barcode scanning?

You cannot connect a barcode scanner to shopVOX directly. Check out our API documentation to see if there is anything you can do there.

What kind of reports can I pull?

As of right now, inventory reports are pretty basic. They contain a lot of basic information. Currently we don’t have any fancy charts that help you visualize your inventory data.

  • Materials by Location: Lets you see the materials, qty, location, checked out by, created by, updated by, associated Sales Order and Line Item 
  • Products by Location: Lets you see the products, qty, location, checked out by, created by, updated by, and associated Sales Order and Line Item 
  • You can easily see products that are below your ROP in the inventory dashboard
  • Export Reorder Points (ROP), Quantities and Average Costs from inventory dashboard (CSV only)

Is your inventory management foolproof?

It is not! It’s important to remember that with all inventory control systems, they are only as good as the data you put into them. If an employee enters 50 instead of 500 when creating a PO or receiving a PO, you might end up with a pretty big discrepancy! This is why cycle counting is a vital part to any successful inventory system for any company.

Screenshots of the Inventory Module:

Material Sett:  You'll see something similar for products.

Inventory Dashboard:

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