Every Decision You Make Rests on the Stock Figure Being Right
What to buy, what you can promise a customer, what your margin actually was. All of it comes off the stock position. An ERP with inaccurate stock is worse than a spreadsheet, because people stop checking and start trusting it. This module owns what you hold, where it sits and what it is worth, and it has to be right before anything built on top of it is worth having.
50+ ERP and software projects. Zero failed projects since 2021.
Accuracy is the whole game, and it is not a software feature
Nothing downstream survives a wrong stock figure. Purchasing buys what you already have, sales promises what you cannot ship, and finance reports a margin that was never earned. The module gives you the structure to hold an accurate position. Holding it is a discipline question.
Record the movement at the moment it happens, or do not bother
Almost every accuracy problem traces back to the same thing: material moved and the transaction was entered later, or by somebody else, or not at all. Stock issued against a verbal request on a Friday afternoon. A receipt booked on Monday for goods that went straight to the line. An adjustment posted to make a count agree, with no reason recorded. Each one is small and each one is invisible until the number is already wrong. We design the process so that a physical movement cannot happen without a transaction, restrict who can post an adjustment, and make every adjustment carry a reason code so the pattern can be investigated rather than absorbed. Software supports that. It will not do it for you.
- No movement without a document, and no document without a moment.
- Adjustment rights restricted and every adjustment given a reason code.
- Shrinkage, damage and count correction reported separately, not lumped together.
Most stock arguments are two people reading different numbers
On hand is what is physically in the building. Allocated is the part of it already committed to open orders and work orders. Free is what is left, and it is the only number anyone should quote to a customer. Incoming is what is on a confirmed purchase order or transfer with a date against it. Sales looks at on hand and promises stock that production reserved last week. Production looks at free and thinks purchasing is asleep. Fix it by deciding, once, which number appears on which screen, and by making available to promise read free stock plus confirmed incoming inside the lead time, never on hand. It is a small configuration decision that removes a standing argument.
- Available to promise uses free stock plus confirmed incoming, with dates.
- Allocation happens at order confirmation, not at picking, so the commitment is visible.
- Goods in transit held in its own state rather than counted at either end.
Six areas that decide whether your stock figure holds
The physical handling belongs to warehouse management and the forward plan belongs to supply chain. This module owns the record: what exists, where it sits at location level, and what it is worth.
The stock movement lifecycle, from receipt to adjustment
Five states, each one a posted transaction with a date, a cost and a name against it. If any step can happen without a transaction, the position drifts.
What we set up when we build this module
Item master and UoM design
A coding scheme, attribute and variant structure, purchase to stock to sales unit conversions, and a de-duplicated master loaded and reconciled.
Traceability configuration
Batch, lot or serial per item group, expiry and shelf life rules, FEFO picking order and a forward and backward trace report you can run in a recall.
Valuation and GL mapping
Costing method chosen per item group with the margin effect written down, stock accounts mapped, and variance accounts set up if you go standard cost.
Stock ledger reconciliation
A monthly routine that ties the stock ledger to the control account, with the common causes of divergence closed off at source rather than journalled away.
Cycle count programme
ABC classification from your own value and movement data, a count calendar per class, count sheets, tolerance rules and an accuracy measure that gets reported.
Reorder and adjustment controls
Reorder point and min max rules per item and location, plus a reason code list for adjustments, write-offs and shrinkage with approval limits behind it.
What an accurate stock position actually buys you
What this connects to
Inventory holds the record. The physical operation, the forward plan and the optimisation of the numbers sit next door.
Why teams bring us in to set up inventory
Inventory module questions
Which stock valuation method should we choose?
How do we actually get stock accuracy up?
Do we need batch and serial tracking, and can we add it later?
Can cycle counting replace the annual stocktake?
Why does the stock ledger not agree with the general ledger?
How does the module handle the same item across several locations?
Get Your Stock Figure Right
Book a free consultation. We will look at your item master, how movements are recorded today, how stock is valued and where the ledger stops agreeing with the GL, and give you a straight view on what it takes to hold accuracy above 98 percent.
Book a Free Consultation →No commitment. A practical review of your stock data and your movement process, whichever ERP you run.
What Is Inside the Inventory Module
The item master that everything else inherits, the traceability record that a recall depends on, the valuation that finance reports, and the stock ledger that sits under all three. Here is what each one covers and what we set up.
From the item code to the valuation finance signs off
Get the codes and the units right and the rest follows
A coding structure that a buyer can read, attributes held as attributes rather than baked into the description, and variants modelled as variants so size and colour do not each become a separate part. Units of measure carry conversion factors, so you can buy in drums, hold in litres and sell in five litre packs without anyone doing arithmetic in their head. The rule we enforce hardest is the boring one: do not create a new item for every small difference. A master with four codes for the same bearing cannot be counted, cannot be valued and cannot be planned.
- Purchase, stock and sales units with conversion factors per item.
- Variants and attributes structured instead of encoded in free text.
- Duplicate detection before load, and a rule on who may create an item after go live.
Traceability that answers a recall in minutes, not days
Batch or lot for anything made or bought in runs, serial for high value discrete units, with manufacture date, expiry date and shelf life held against the batch. Picking follows first expired first out rather than whatever is nearest the door, and stock approaching its expiry date is visible before it becomes a write-off. The trace runs in both directions: pick a supplier lot and see every customer who received it, or start from a customer complaint and get back to the receipt. Design this in at the start. It cannot be retrofitted onto history, and switching it on later leaves everything already in stock without an identity.
- Batch, lot or serial set per item group, not one blanket setting.
- Shelf life and expiry rules driving FEFO allocation and near-expiry alerts.
- Forward and backward trace reports you can hand to an auditor or a regulator.
A stock value that ties to the control account every month
FIFO follows the physical flow and reports older cost against current revenue, so in a rising market it flatters margin. Weighted average smooths the movement and is the low maintenance default for most businesses. Standard cost gives you clean variance analysis, and in exchange demands that somebody sets the standards, reviews purchase price and usage variances each period, and runs a revaluation when the standard changes. Whichever you pick, the stock ledger records every movement as a dated costed line, and we set up the monthly routine that ties it to the general ledger stock control account so divergence is caught in weeks.
- Costing method chosen per item group with the margin effect documented.
- Stock, variance and write-off accounts mapped and the control account locked to manual posting.
- A monthly reconciliation pack rather than a year end investigation.
Everything the module setup delivers
Clean item master
Coded, de-duplicated, attributes and variants structured, units and conversions set, loaded and reconciled against your existing list.
Traceability record
Batch, lot or serial per item group, expiry and shelf life rules, FEFO allocation and trace reports in both directions.
Valuation configuration
Costing method per item group, account mapping into the GL, and variance and revaluation handling where you run standard cost.
Reconciliation routine
A monthly stock ledger to control account check, with the usual causes of divergence closed off at source instead of journalled away.
Cycle count calendar
ABC classification from your own value and movement data, a count frequency per class, tolerance rules and a reported accuracy figure.
Multi-location rules
Per location balances and valuation, transfer documents with despatch and receipt, goods in transit as its own state, and reorder points per site.