In some cases, a central warehouse is linked to several POS companies that place dealer orders on the central warehouse. This is known as Inter System Ordering (ISO). The order may be a direct sales request on the warehouse for parts, or a purchase order that the warehouse submits to the manufacturer on the dealer's behalf.
Orders are raised by the dealer via Purchase Control and transferred to the warehouse via a Generic File Transfer (GFT). In order to process these files, the following steps must be taken:
Note: The receipt and import of orders, and the export of advice notes from the Autoline system are normally performed by a Timed Operation.
Upload and convert (receive) customer orders into a format recognised by the Autoline system.
Import dealer orders to the Autoline system, to create the necessary WIPs and purchase orders on the warehouse.
Produce picking notes. This can be done in one of two ways:
By actioning the WIP in the normal way in Point-of-Sale, and clicking the Picking slip button.
Using the Picking note option in the Batch print documents program.
When the parts are picked, decard the parts from stock. This can be done in one of two ways:
By actioning the WIP in the normal way in Point-of-Sale, and clicking the Requisition button.
Note: To decard parts from stock, it is recommended that the Confirm picking notes option is used in preference to the Advice notes option in the Batch print documents program. Within the Confirm picking note option you can specify the exact number of parts picked from the warehouse, whereas the Batch print documents option assumes that all parts are in stock.
Export advice notes from the Autoline system ready for transmission to the dealer.
The SO CUSTOMER ORDER IMPORTS menu is displayed when you select the Customer orders option from the POINT OF SALE menu. The options to receive customer orders, import dealer orders and export advice notes are normally run by a Timed Operation, either overnight or periodically. However, you can manually run these options in the event of a problem, and view any errors that occur on receipt of the dealer order.
Note: The SO CUSTOMER ORDER IMPORTS menu is only displayed if the selected company is set up as a warehouse (buddy branch) in the Depots and Branches file.
Receive customer orders: Converts dealer order files to the format recognised by the Autoline system.
Errors with customer orders: This option only appears on the menu if an error occurs when the dealer order is received, in which case a text file is created. This option allows you to view the errors in the text file.
Import dealer orders: Imports dealer orders to the Autoline system, and automatically creates the necessary WIPs and purchase orders.
Export advice notes: Exports advice notes ready for transmission to the dealer.
View import log file: This enables you to look at recent orders imported for tracking and reporting purposes.
