How to Track Inventory: Reorder Points and Stock Counts

1Inventory Tracking Starts With Records

The way to know how much is on the shelf is to record everything that changes stock. A sale at the till takes the product out of stock and a return puts it back. A supplier delivery, a damaged product or goods sent to another branch change stock too; if they are not recorded, the numbers soon drift away from the shelf.

PratikKasa calculates stock from a movement ledger. Sales and returns are written to the ledger automatically; you add the other movements:

• Stock in. A supplier delivery or a customer return. You can also enter the supplier and the document number.
• Stock out and waste. Internal use, or a product that is damaged, broken or past its expiry date. Each movement has a reason.
• Transfer. Goods moving from one branch to another. They leave the sending branch's stock and enter the receiving branch's stock.

The window does not save a stock-out that would take stock below zero. Every movement stays in Movement History and can be filtered by period, movement type or supplier. On a phone, you add stock in, stock out and waste from the Stock screen.

2Calculate the Reorder Point

The reorder point is the stock level at which you should order again. If you order when stock reaches this number, what you have lasts until the new stock arrives. The calculation has two parts:

• Sales during the lead time. Multiply the product's average daily sales by the number of days the supplier takes to deliver after you order.
• Safety stock. Add a small amount that covers a few more days of sales in case stock arrives late or sales rise.

Work out average daily sales from the last few weeks; for products whose sales change with the season, redo the calculation at the start of each season. Enter the result in the product's Low stock alert field in PratikKasa. A product without a threshold alerts you only when it runs out.

3See Low Stock in Time

When stock drops to the threshold or below, PratikKasa marks the product as low and sends you a notification. If many products run low at once, you get a single summary notification. You can see low stock in three places:

• Stock Management. On Windows, the list shows out-of-stock products first, then products below their threshold. The Low Stock and Out of Stock filters list only those.
• Today screen. The Needs Attention section shows how many products are below their threshold; from that row you go straight to stock.
• Notifications. The bell's list holds the products that reached their threshold or ran out. On a phone, if you allowed notifications, the alert also reaches your phone.

With several branches, stock is read from each branch's own ledger. The alert looks at the stock of the branch you sell from; you can cover a product running low at one branch with a transfer from another.

4Check Your Records With a Stock Count

However carefully records are kept, the shelf drifts over time: products get lost, scanned wrongly or not recorded. A stock count reveals the gap. If you have many products, you can count a part of them every week instead of counting everything on one day.

When you start a count in PratikKasa, products are listed with their expected quantities. You count the shelf and enter the number, or the count goes up by one each time you scan a barcode. When you complete the count, products with a difference are recorded as a count surplus or shortage in stock movements; products you did not count keep their stock.

Counts work without an internet connection. Earlier counts stay in Count History with their date, the person who started them and their discrepancies.

The drawings in this post are based on the screens of PratikKasa 2.1.0.