Use this feature to release reserved stock back into inventory from sales orders
that have not been delivered/picked up within a user-specified period, or
whose delivery/pickup has been postponed more than a user-specified number of times.
You can then allocate the stock to other sales orders.
If you activate this feature on your system, the End of Day process examines open orders and releases reserved stock based on parameters you specify for selected locations. The Warehouse/Store Location Settings contains fields for both delivery and pickup orders in which you can specify
the number of days past the delivery/pickup date you want items to remain reserved to the order before automatically releasing them back into inventory, and
the number of times deliveries/pickups can be postponed before automatically releasing their line items back into inventory.
When you run the End of Day process, Auto Stock Release determines the selling location of each open order. If the selling location has no Auto Stock Release parameters specified, the process ignores the order. If the selling location has Auto Stock Release parameters specified, the process applies the parameters to determine if any orders qualify for auto stock-release.
For all items selected by Auto Stock Release, the process changes the delivery status to CWC (customer will call), thereby removing the associated delivery date and causing the reserved stock to be released back into inventory. Those items are then available for inclusion in the Automatic Stock Commitments process, which runs after the Automatic Stock Release process during the End of Day procedure. For line items that already have a delivery status of CWC, the process releases any manually-reserved stock.
Auto Stock Release applies to sales orders only. Other transaction
types, for example exchanges, are not affected by this functionality.
The Multiple
Delivery Dates feature is not compatible with Auto Stock Release.
If you activate one of these features, you de-activate the other.
The Customer Order Information Screen displays the following two running counters showing the order's delivery date postponements:
Delivery/Pickup Postponed Since Last Release NNN - displays the number of times the delivery date has been postponed since the last time the order had stock automatically released.
Total NNN - displays the total number of times the delivery date has been postponed in the history of the order.
These counters increment only when users postpone deliveries/pickups via Sales Order Entry and only when the date status is EST or SCH. If you are changing a delivery/pickup date from CWC to an EST or SCH date, counter does not increment. Other processes which allow delivery rescheduling (for example, Delivery Scheduling or Delivery Manifesting) do not increment the counters. Furthermore, partial completions (delivery or pickup) do not affect these counters.
To prevent users from postponing deliveries once the maximum number of postponements for a selling location has been reached, use the following field:
Override Maximum Delivery Date Postponements for Stores - Logistics tab of the User and User Group files.
If you leave this box blank for a user, then once an order has been auto-released via End-of-Day, the system restricts that user from postponing the delivery/pickup date again.
Use the following fields to set up your system for automatic stock release:
Daily Auto Release of Stock (Inventory tab of the Point of Sale Control Settings) - activates Auto Stock Release on your system.
Days Past the Delivery Date (Merchandise tab of the Warehouse/Store Location Settings) - auto-releases orders whose delivery date has been surpassed by more than the number of days specified at this field.
Days Past the Pickup Date (Merchandise tab of the Warehouse/Store Location Settings) - auto-releases orders whose pickup date has been surpassed by more the number of days specified at this field.
Delivery Postponements (Merchandise tab of the Warehouse/Store Location Settings) - auto-releases orders whose delivery date has been postponed more than the number of times specified at this field.
Pickup Postponements (Merchandise tab of the Warehouse/Store Location Settings) - auto-releases orders whose pickup date has been postponed more than the number of times specified at this field.
Override Maximum Delivery Date Postponements for Stores (Logistics tab of the User and User Group files) - described in the Security section above.
The Auto Stock Release process qualifies orders as follows:
sales orders only (no exchanges, returns, etc.).
the order cannot be on a shipping manifest.
the order must have at least one delivery or pickup line item.
the order line must be for either an inventory product or a bulk item, and cannot be special-order or as-is.
the order line must have a purchase status of either Active, Markdown, or One-Time-Buy.
the order line must be reserved. Specific pieces may or may not be assigned.
at least one of the Auto Stock Release parameters must be set on the Merchandise tab of the Warehouse/Store Location Settings for the selling location.
the delivery/pickup status must be EST or SCH.
If all of these are true, the program determines if any of the orders exceed one or more parameters set in the Warehouse/Store Location Settings for the selling location. If so, the process releases the line items back into inventory.
Since sales orders can have both delivery and pickup items, the
process handles each order type independently. Thus, the process
may release delivery reservations but leave pickup reservations unchanged,
and vice versa.