3. Item card for materials

Item card for materials #

 

 

Buttons on the item card: #

Save	Saves changed data on the form
Copy	Saves and opens a popup to create a new item by copying the current item.
Delete	Delete an Item that is not in use. If an Item has been used for any order it is not possible to delete it. In this case mark its status as ‘Inactive’.

 

 

Item basic information #

Description	A description of the Item. The description can be modified when in use.
Resource template	Cannot be edited. This is defined when the Item is created.
Resource type	General material for material items
Status	Set as ‘Active’ or ‘Inactive’. Inactive Items cannot be used elsewhere in the system.
Unit of measure	The base unit of measure for purchasing and internal control. Will appear automatically on orders etc.
Item family 1, 2 and 3	Define the available families in ‘Company’ information. Consideration should be given at system set up to the correct use of Item families. A good design of families will allow easier searching of Items in the system and more useful management reporting.
Plan for purchasing or manufacturing	This will define the planned source of the item. If manufacturing, then it is also necessary to create or select a manufacturing template for this item. The manufacturing template contains the necessary data to plan the manufacturing operations of the item. This includes the structure (parts list) and routing.
Manufacturing template	If the item is planned for manufacturing, choose a manufacturing template from this list. In normal usage there will be only one template per item. However if multiple versions of the template are in use, then choose the correct one that is to be used for planning. Multiple versions of the template are managed in the Production section.

 

Status tab #

Summary

Business unit	Shows which business unit’s data is shown here. If your system has more than one business unit, you can select another from dropdown list.
Last cost	The cost of the last inward transaction to the stock. If the last transaction was a purchase order receipt, this is the landed cost of the receipt either specified in the purchase order or in the purchase invoice.
Average cost	Simple weighted average of inward transaction costs since the system was taken into use. This value is only relevant if the current stock value is zero or negative; this situation enables the correct calculation of FIFO costs.
FIFO cost	The current weighted cost value of items in inventory according to the FIFO principle (First in first out). This is the primary number used for the cost of an item throughout the system. It can only be calculated if there is a positive stock quantity for the item. See later for details on how the FIFO value is calculated.
Stock quantity	Total stock quantity is the current stock (inventory) quantity for all locations. It does not include materials that have been issued to work orders (WIP – Work in progress).
Free in stock	The free in stock quantity is that part of the total stock that is not allocated to any sales or work orders. In other words, this is the quantity that can be used without affecting any planned operation. Because it is possible that the demand for an item gets larger than the stock quantity, the free stock quantity can become negative.
Stock locations	Stock quantity may be at several different locations. Each location has a line of its own. Possible locations are defined in the partners section. Each partner address is a possible location. Note that it is possible to exclude a certain location from being available for allocation by checking the appropriate box on the partner form. Items can be moved to a different stock location by going to the Warehouse home page and selecting “New Material transfer” from the blue bar. Also items can be purchased to, and sold from, a particular stock location.

 

Stock values are calculated according to the FIFO principle (‘First In, First Out’).

 

FIFO is a method for calculating an average where the last items to arrive in inventory are used for the weighted calculation. The calculation algorithm first calculates how much of the Item is in stock and then calculates the average from each of the last arrivals into inventory, going backwards in time until the required quantity has been reached.

 

This means that every time a stock change occurs, the proportion of the oldest procurement prices decreases (this concerns both negative and positive stock changes). On the other hand, if the batch sizes are approximately the same, unit costs of the latest batches will be emphasized.

 

Materials are issued to work orders with the FIFO cost. Similarly the margin of a product sale is according to the FIFO cost, not the manufacturing cost of an individual item.

 

Average cost depends on the batches that are left in stock.

 

Note that to find the FIFO value, the quantity must be known. The FIFO value on the item card shows the value per unit of the total quantity in stock. If some of the items in stock are taken to a work order or sold, then the FIFO value of these items will not necessarily be the same because the calculation will be weighted by that part of the total quantity that was taken from stock. So if costs are increasing over time, the cost of a part of the stock sold will be less than the unit cost of the whole stock. After these items are removed from stock the per unit stock value will increase.

 

Note that it is impossible for FIFO to be calculated when stock quantities are zero or negative. In this case if items are removed from stock, the value of those items will be calculated as the average of all transactions for that item since the system has been taken into use. If items have been received with variable costs over time, then operating the system with negative stock quantities may give unexpected costs for work orders and sales order margins.

 

 

Note that unit cost will change when:

 

• Stock quantity is edited manually in the Warehouse section

• Stock quantity is updated using an inventory spreadsheet transfer.

• Increasing the stock quantity manually. (When increasing the stock quantity manually, enter the unit cost directly in the ‘Unit Cost’ field. This cost will be included in the calculated unit cost after the changes are saved. In the spreadsheet ‘Import Inventory’, unit costs can be defined for each stock location.)

 

In templates

If an item exists in the product structure of an item, this is shown here. This also lists itself in its own template.

 

Future stock

Shows the planned future stock transactions. Positive numbers are arriving in stock and negative numbers refer to consumption in work orders or item sales. It is possible to hide or remove the effect of tentative orders in the grid. See the Sales section for information of tentative orders.

 

Previous stock

Shows the history of stock transactions for the item.

 

Quotations (Purchase items only)

Shows current supplier quotations for an item. Supplier quotations are entered in the Purchase section.

 

Price history

Shows a history of invoice prices for the item. Invoices are entered in the Invoice section.

 

Forecast needs

‘Needs / day’: shows the planned future stock activity together with the results of scheduled comparative forecasts.

 

‘Needs / week’: (Purchase items only): a summary of planned requirements summed by week.

 

‘Needs / month’: (Purchase items only): a summary of planned requirements summed by month.

 

Lot information

If an item (or item component) has Lot tracking enabled, then this tab details information regarding the Lot tracking – this includes the Lot ID number, Lot tracking dates and quantities.

 

Commercial tab #

 

Customs ID	Customs ID will be used in pro forma invoices printed for customs. If a customs ID is entered in delivery details, it will be updated here.
Default sales delivery days	When entering a sales order, the promise date of the line will be this number of days into the future. If zero then no delivery date will be entered.
EAN number	The unique identifier for this item. Commonly used in the barcode labelling of a product for wholesale or retail sales. The EAN number can be used to retrieve the item in the Direct Sales operation.
Configuration ID	If the material is used in a configured product, this is the description that will be shown on the description of the product.
Sales unit of measure	The unit of measure used in sales. Sales orders show both the sales unit of measure and the basic unit of measure. Leave this field blank unless you wish to show your customer two units of measure on the various papers. For instance if you stock cloth in rolls but wish to show your customer how many metres he is buying, then set the base unit as “rolls” and the sales unit as “m”. Then add the conversion between rolls and metres in the scaling box. By default papers will show both measures.
Sales unit of measure scaling	The multiplier for the above.
Purchase account	Optionally specify the default purchase account for this item. If not specified the default used in invoicing will be taken from the supplier’s information in the Partners section.
Product country of origin	The country of origin will be printed on shipping documents.
Landed cost increment %	Specify the landed cost increment in purchase orders and purchase invoices. The landed cost will be used to update inventory values and not the purchase order price. The idea of landed cost is to include freight and other charges into the inventory value of purchased items. The inventory will be updated by the landed cost in the purchase order when the goods are received. When the invoice is written into the system the landed cost will be updated by the value written at that time.
Default dispatch from country	Used for intrastate reporting of purchased items. This is the default value for the dispatch from a country entered to a purchase invoice for this item
VAT Rate	The VAT (tax or GST) code to be used on this item instead of the default (which comes from the sales or purchase account of a partner). Leave this blank for normal items and set only for a “reduced rate” item, for instance children’s clothes in the UK
Purchase lead time (days)	The number of days before the Item must be ordered to be able to receive it on time. This is used by the purchase planning automation to calculate when a purchase order should be made. Note! Change of this value affects the purchase planning only after the next night run.
Purchaser	When automatic purchases are created, it is possible to group the purchase needs by purchasers that are defined here.
Cost centre	Optionally specify the default cost centre for this item. If not specified the default used in invoicing will be taken from the supplier’s information in the Partners section.
Supplier by offer	When automatic purchase orders are created, suppliers will be selected by best quotations. Otherwise the selection is by preferred supplier. See suppliers’ quotations in the Purchase section.
Intrastat 2nd quantity	Used where required for Intrastat reporting.
Intrastat 2nd unit	The unit of measure for the above.
Exclude from cost calculations	The costs of this material are excluded when work order costs are calculated.
Economic order quantity	The EOQ for an item is entered here. Line quantities on purchase orders can then be rounded to this figure if desired. The EOQ needs to be calculated in an external system e.g. spread sheet. The system will not calculate it automatically, but the desired value is stored here and used by the purchase planner.
Delivery handling cost	Specify an item’s delivery handling cost here. This can be used for calculating EOQ in an external system.
Yearly unit storage cost	Specify a yearly unit storage cost for an item here. This can be used for calculating EOQ in an external system.
Ignore sales discount	Click the checkbox to exclude this item from sales discounts that may be specified on a company’s partner card. This feature is used so that certain individual items can be excluded from a general discount specified for a customer.

 

 

Technical tab #

 

 

Designer	The person responsible for design of this product. Informational only.
Unit rounding	Rounding accuracy. Specify as a number how the rounding of items will occur in the system. E.g. 0,1 will round quantities to 0,1 of a unit. For discreet items use 1 here. This number is of particular importance if a shrink % is used in planning.
Exclude from backflush	When backflush is used in manufacturing for a whole product, this will exclude this particular item from the backflush functionality.
ABC	The ABC classification of the item. Can be a value from A to I. Inventory lists can be retrieved by ABC classification
Exclude from planning	Planned orders will not be made for this Item.
Lot tracking	Includes the Item in lot tracking. See lot tracking in the Warehouse section.
Quality control	Flags this Item to be included in quality control reports. Typically these Items would only be used when repairing work in production.
Serial number tracking	Includes the Item in serial number tracking. See the for a description of how serial numbering works.
Serial number record only	Requires serial numbers only when this item is used, not when it is received or created.
Serial number prefix	When serial numbers are created automatically, this field will be used as a prefix for the number.
Minimum free stock level	The smallest quantity that can be unallocated in stock without generating a purchase requirement.
Exclude item from minimum stock check	If negative stock levels are not allowed at a stock location (which is set in the partner card for the stock location address), then this will allow the item to go negative anyway. Useful for consumbables where stock control is not relevant.
Rough cut loading	This should be used for products only and is the value of the company’s rough cut capacity planning unit. For instance if you are producing wooden floors by the package, you may want to use m2 for your rough cut capacity planning. This property should contain the number of m2 in one package. If you are not using any physical unit, then use standard work hours. This unit is included in the sales order analysis report, and will be included in other features of the system in future releases.
Resource Details (URL)	This field is for recording an Internet address where additional information can be found. The link will be displayed as a clickable link at the top of the item card. For local files it is recommended to use a web server as browser technology normally prevents links to local file locations.
Shelf location	Where the item can be found in stock. The available list options are specified in the ‘Company Properties’. Useful for sorting inventory reports. Note that Manu Online does not support “dynamic” shelving. An item can only be related to one shelf location.
Shrink %	How much of the material is normally lost in operations. The planning system will plan to procure sufficient extra materials to cover for shrinkage.
Weight	The unit weight.
Volume	The packed unit volume.
Custom properties	It is possible to store custom data related to an item. This data is created and edited on the technical tab. Custom properties are fields that contain data related to only one item. Custom data can be of the types Decimal, Text, Date, Currency or Bit (True/False).

 

Budget tab #

 

Budgeted costs are used to calculate planned manufacturing costs. An unlimited number of budgets can be created. It is recommended to create at least one cost budget. These may be based on a certain time period such as ‘Year 2016 base budget’, or be for specific purposes such as a quotation e.g. ‘Planned cost of Quote 1234’.

 

The budgeted costs of an item can be seen when writing purchase orders.

 

Budget ID’s are created in ‘Company’ information.

 

Only purchased materials can have values in a cost budget. The cost budget of a manufactured item is calculated and shown when producing one of the cost reports.

 

Recording an Item’s budgeted cost

Once budget IDs are created (you can do this in the ‘System Settings’ section of your company properties), select the Budget tab on the item summary page. This opens a screen where the following information can be recorded:

 

• Budget Name: select the budget from the ‘Budget Name’ dropdown menu.

• Link to currency: to which currency the budgeted cost is linked

• Budgeted Exchange Rate: the currency rate that the budgeted cost is based on

• Currency range: this indicates how much the currency rate can change without changing the budgeted cost

• Proportion of Currency: the proportion of the currency rate change that is moved to the budgeted cost if the rate change exceeds the limits of the change range

• Budgeted cost.

 

Pricing tab #

 

Price lists are used when writing sales orders: the unit prices will be retrieved from the price list in use. In addition, price lists can be printed out to be sent to a customer.

 

The list of price lists is created in ‘Company Settings’ screen of the Admin menu. Each partner can have an associated price list which is specified on that company’s partner details. One price list can be specified as the default price list. If a partner does not have an associated price list then the default price list is used when entering a sales order.

 

When the system is first created a price list called “Default” is created. This can be used or deleted as needed.

 

An item is added to a price list by adding the price list to the Item information. To do this, select the ‘Pricing’ tab (where a line appears, allowing you to associate a desired price list with this item). Choose the price list from the dropdown menu of the ‘Sales Price List’ field; there is also an empty field for the price. The other fields are:

 

• Price list description (defined when the price list is created)

• Price list currency (after the price)

• Date when the price has been updated (or added for the first time)

• A tick box for removing the price, which means removing the item from the price list.

• After entering the price click the green tick to save. A new line then appears, enabling you to associate more price lists with this item if needed

 

Customer codes tab #

 

An item can have multiple customer codes, but only one for each specific customer. The customer related data is the customer item id and the customer’s description for the item.

 

This information will be shown, for example, in sales orders and invoices (together with the items own internal item id and description).

 

Manufacturer codes tab #

Items can be linked to their manufacturers and manufacturer’s part numbers. This should be done for purchased items only

 

 

When manufacturers are linked to suppliers in the Partner card, they and the part numbers can be used in purchasing.

 

Besides the company name there are fields for

 

• Manufacturer part number

• Pieces per package

• Unit of measure

• Unit scaling (the ratio between the manufacturer’s unit sized and the items stocking unit. For instance if you are converting barrels to litres.

• Manufacturer’s comments (may be a link to the manufacturer’s data sheet)

• Internal comments (may be a link to your own documents on this item).

• There are also fields concerning units of measurement and unit scaling

 

The status on manufacturer’s line tells whether your company has accepted the item if it is manufactured by this particular manufacturer. The status can be ‘Approved’, ‘Disapproved’, ‘In evaluation’ or ‘Obsolete’.

 

If there are several manufacturers, mark one as the preferred manufacturer.

 

 

Manufacturing tab #

The manufacturing tab is only available if the item is “Plan for manufacturing” as shown in the top section of the item card.

 

If you wish to have an item that has a product structure, but nevertheless is planned for purchasing, it is possible to create the manufacturing template for the item but not use it for planning.

 

To set up a manufactured item in the system, the following information is needed:

 

1. A Cell – ensure that at least one work cell exists in the system. By default there will be one cell with the same name as the company. If routing is not used or licenced, use just this single cell throughout.

2. A Route – ensure that at least one route exists in the system. By default there will be one route with the same name as the company, and this will consist of one step as mentioned above. If routing is not used or licenced, use just this single route throughout.

3. Items used by the manufactured item – ensure that the required items that are used in the manufacturing have been created. Typically create all purchased material items and any required work or machine items.

4. The manufactured item – finally, create the manufactured item. Select the appropriate route for it and populate the list of consumed items on the structure.

 

Cells and routing are setup in the Production main menu. For a new system where routing is not being used, use the defaults that come with the system.

 

Note that for make-to-order items, it is possible to edit and extend the product structure and routing for the sales order line itself without affecting the data stored in the item card. Thus for products that are made differently each time to customer’s requirements it may be wise to leave the product structure rather empty, consisting only of those items that are truly common to the generic product.

 

A manufactured item can be associated with (i.e.created by) more than one manufacturing template. This can be done so that a single item can have different versions of the product structure for instance. When creating a new work order the user can then choose which version of the product to make. However, only one manufacturing template can be selected for planning purposes and this is chosen in the dropdown list on the top section of the item card. For further information on creating multiple manufacturing templates for a single item see the Manufacturing section.

 

Structure subtab #

 

 

The Structure subtab contains the data for the product structure of the manufactured item. The product structure is a list of items that are required to produce the manufactured item, together with the quantities needed to produce it.

 

Note that items of all generic types can be added to the structure. For example both materials and work time can be added to one step. (This is why it is not called a Bill of Materials

 

Also, an item can exist in the structure multiple times on different steps, but can only occur once on each step.

 

Each consumed item is specified according to the step of the route to which it is consumed. Therefore it is recommended to specify the route on the routing tab before adding items to the structure. It is possible to change the route later however, but if the new route has different step numbers then the items on the structure may be moved automatically to valid steps on the new route. If routing is not used on the system, then there will be a standard route with one step whose step number is 10.

 

The quantity refers to the actual quantity consumed at that step, per unit of the manufactured product. If not using the per piece unit of measure be especially careful that the quantities are valid for the unit of measure of the product.

 

When a work order is created, the planned quantity for each item will be the consumed quantity times the work order quantity, plus the fixed quantity specified in the structure.

 

The options button opens a pop-up screen where the information needed for the sales configurator is needed. See the section on sales configurator for further information.

 

Routing subtab #

 

The Routing subtab displays information of the default route of the product. Select the desired route from the drop down list and press save.

 

The choice and content of routes can not be edited here. This is done in the Factory setup section. 

 

If the route is changed and the new route has different step numbers on it from the old, then the product structure will be updated with valid step numbers.

 

The route specified here is the default when manufacturing a product. When the work order is opened it is possible to change the actual route steps used by the product manufacturing process. For instance if there is a choice of work cells for a certain product then specify the most common here.

 

Properties subtab #

This contains the parameters that control the way that a work order created for this item is processed in the system.

 

Design properties are valid for setting on the item card. Shopfloor properties are valid only when the work order is created, and should normally be left blank on the item card. In exceptional cases the default values can be set for the shopfloor properties on the item card.

 

Design properties:

 

Make at assembly	For subassemblies: if this property is ‘on’, manufacturing the subassembly will be merged in the work order where the final product is manufactured. Use this only on the sub assembly itself. Do not set it on the parent product.
Close work order on last step	The work order will be automatically closed when the last step of the route is completed. The work order will not be closed if lot tracking or serial number information is not complete. This is useful for high volume manufacturing where a work order can be closed by using a bar code scan to mark the last step as complete.
Default Batch Size	Used to allocate fixed quantities of Items (usually setup hours) in correct relation to per unit Items when automatically scheduling work.
Maximum batch size	When creating work orders in bulk, the system will limit the number of products on one work order to this number and if necessary create more work orders. For instance, if the maximum batch size is 1, and 5 items are required then 5 work orders (each of 1 product) will be created.
Planned Throughput Periods (Fixed)	The number of periods used to calculate the difference between the required start date and the required finish date. The number of periods in a day, the number of minutes in a period and the number of working days in a week are specified in the company section.
Planned throughput periods per unit	The time for manufacturing  one unit of product. The total throughput time is the sum of the fixed periods plus the periods per unit times batch size.
Dedicated work order	When this product is added to a sales order line, it will use the dedicated work order process. (Also known as Make to Order) When the order is activated, a work order will be created regardless if there is the same item id freely available in stock. Also it is possible to edit the properties and structure of the work order on the sales order line. At shipping time, it is not possible to ship the sales order line unless the dedicated work order has been completed.
Open work order automatically	Automatically opens a work order when a sales order line for this product is activated.
Work Instruction	Text comment or a hyperlink to a work instruction document on another server.

 

Shop-floor properties:

 

Comment to customer	Comments that the customer can see through the order tracking site.
Comments	Internal comments
Estimated Completion Date	Can be seen by customer in order tracking (if access is given)
Product lot number	The lot number of products created by this order. If blank, the work order number is used. Only relevant when lot tracking is enabled for the product.
Status code	A user defined status code. The available values are defined in the ‘Own company’ section.
Production foreman	The foreman responsible for the work order
Dimension 1, 2, 3	Used by the dimensions extension to set the dimensions’ units.
Volume, area, weight	Used by the dimension extension for calculating the product structure’s total requirements on a sales order.

 

 

By-Products subtab #

 

In certain manufacturing processes, a work order will create more than one product. There will be one main product and a number of by-products.

 

When the manufactured item is created, the main product will be listed here with a quantity of one. Add any by-products of the work order on this screen. It will then be possible to create by-products in the Production menu when the work order is completed.

 

Part Designators subtab #

 

Part designators are the references to the item on an engineering drawing. Part designators are added as text relative to items in the product structure. One item can have many part designators.

 

Custom data subtab #

It is possible to add custom fields to the manufacturing template. These fields will be prefixed with a ~ mark and can be of the types Decimal, Currency, Date, Text or Logical (Yes/No).

 

 

 

Versions sub tab #

 

It is possible to create and manage multiple versions of an item’s manufacturing template. However only one can be active at any one time. The different versions are normally edited for changes in a product’s structure that does not require a change in the product item id. (i.e. customers do not need to know there has been a design improvement.) Other design properties are also included in the version, so it might reflect a change in manufacturing strategy.

 

To create a new version, select one previous version and press Duplicate selected. Then edit it. Finally activate it. Activating it will change the displayed value for the Manufacturing template shown on the top part of the screen.

 

Backflush sub tab #

Backflush is the process of automatically issuing items to work orders according to plan. It is used to reduce data entry on the shopfloor in manufacturing processes where item usage remains sufficiently close to planned usage that there is no sense to manually record all transactions. There are several options for backflush depending on whether the backflush is to be carried out on the work order or the step, and at the beginning or end.

 

For simple, high volume production, consider the use of backflush on step completion together with “close work order on the last step”. This will allow items to be backflushed and product put to stock and the work order to be closed all in one (possibily barcoded) operation. On the work cell screen the user will be prompted to enter the scrap amount so that backflush uses the total of good production and scrap, while product is put to stock per the quantity of good production.