Item Locations
Inventory Item Locations
Item locations provide a way to track inventory quantities that are grown in different locations. Not only can the item-location record track item-growing areas, the ability to assign on hand quantities to selling seasons and to statuses is also a major feature available in GrowPoint.
The simplest way to understand item locations is to think of the same item grown in different physical locations. Each location has a different on hand quantity as well as other information associated with each physical location. For example, plants at one location may have been planted at a different time then plants located in another area. Or the plants may have different liner sources in each location.
Each inventory item may have an unlimited number of locations. To add a new location, right click on the Add button at the bottom left of the grid. Item Location Records are entered in the drill down box shown below.
Location: The Location field identifies physical location. Prior to creating item locations, set up Locations Codes on the Inventory Set up Screen. The Location Code and Location Descriptions are printed on many GrowPoint reports. For example, on an order pull slip, if an order item has been assigned to a specific location for shipping, the location code appears on the report. To activate the lookup screen, right click while the cursor is in the location field.
Status: This field can be used to further identify an item location. There is no best way to use the Status field. The status field is displayed in Order Entry when allocating to a location. It’s also an option to print on the pull slip. Depending on the requirements of inventory management, status may be used to ready date, the physical status of the plant such as bud, bloom or foliage, or not at all. Status is a twenty-character code that is optional when setting up item location records. If the same item exists in a location but has a different status, such as some quantities being ready before other quantities, use the status field to further identify these amounts. Each location MUST have a unique Location or combination of Location Status. In other words, you cannot have an item with exactly the same Location name. However, you can have an item in the same Location but with a different status. You may not have the same item in the same Location Status combination. It does not matter if any of the other fields in that location are unique, the combination of Location and Status must be unique.
Season: Season is another field used to further identify item locations, and is optional. With this field, the season codes must be set up prior to attaching a season to the item locations. Season codes are created in the Inventory Set up Screen. Season is a powerful feature of GrowPoint. By attaching a Season Code to an item location, you have the ability to project when specific on-hand quantities for each item will become available for sale in different selling seasons. For example, suppose your crop plan states an estimate that 4500 plants will be available for sale in Spring 2001 and in the Spring of 2002 the estimate is for 3000 plants available for sale. By identifying the item location with a Season Code, these estimates can be easily entered into inventory as separate item locations. Even though the item location has the same physical location, the Season Code indicates the amounts available in different seasons.
Season On Hand Qty Sellable Spring 2011 4500 Y Spring 2012 3000 N
Priority: When an item has many item locations, the ability to prioritize what location is pulled for sales orders should be considered. If you want to clear one location before pulling plants from other locations, use the Priority field to set up the sequence. The system starts with the lowest priority number which is 0 and then moves to 1, 2, etc. when automatically assigning item locations on sales orders. Usually only sellable items are set up with a priority.
Sellable: If the item is sellable in the current season, mark it sellable. Orders can be allocated against non-sellable items. Several of the inventory reports have an option to list sellable, non-sellable or both. The Help screens in Order Entry only list sellable quantities.
Onhand: Each item location has a quantity that is either sellable or non-sellable. To change an item location on hand amount, simply type in the new count. When a new quantity is entered on the Item Location Screen, the system automatically records the transactions as a “Count” in the Inventory Transaction File. Although you can select a specific reason code for changing inventory, the system records only the new count amount. To accurately track changes to inventory because of other reasons, enter changes through the Inventory Adjustment or Inventory Transfer Screens.
Pull Sequence: A pull sequence number can be assigned to each item location. The pull sequence is used in the Digging Module to sort inventory locations according to a predefined sequence. The pull sequence in the Digging Module represents the pull sequence that is used if you walked through your nursery and pulled one of each item in a location.
Lot Number: The Lot number field is assigned by the Production Scheduling Module or can be manually entered to track a particular crop. Lot number does show in the allocations screens in Order Entry.
Sales Account No: To track general ledger activity for sales by item location, enter a valid G/L account number. This G/L account does not post to the general ledger through the A/R Posting Screen, but does appear on the Daily Sales Report. Use this account to breakdown sales by account number. For example, you may want to assign a different account number for sales when an item is purchased from another source. Leave this field empty to use the default Sales G/L account number set up on the Item Code.
Asset Account No: To track general ledger activity for sales by item location, enter a valid G/L account number. If a Sales account number is entered for each item location record, chances are you want to also set up an Asset account number for each item location. Leave this field empty to use the default Asset G/L account number set up on the Item Code.
Planting Date, Initial Plant Qty, etc.: The remaining fields on the Item Location Screen can be used to record different types of information required by your inventory management needs. Although these fields aren’t required by the system, you can enter information on this screen and use the Crystal Report Writer to extract data from the Item Location File.
Cost Code: The Cost Basis Code is used to assign a default cost to an item location record. The concept of Cost Basis is discussed in the Inventory Set up section. Leave this field empty to use the default Cost Basis or Cost per Unit amount set up on the Item Code record. More informatioin on cost codes here.
Cost Per Unit: Enter a Cost Per Unit amount for each item location. If the item location is used when receiving a Purchase Order, the cost per unit is updated from the Purchase Order Module. The system uses average cost.
Comments: This field may be used to enter miscellaneous information about an item location.