Advanced Serial Number Features

This section covers optional advanced features that capture additional data or extend the workflow. By default they are inactive.

Expiry Dates

If the Company-level profile setting Use expiry dates for batched & serialised items is active, the system will offer and expect expiry dates to be entered on serial records if the Item Expires option is also checked on the Details 1 tab of the Stock item. Expiry dates are entered in the form dd.mm.yy.

Pre-Assignment

Pre-assignment is the process of linking or associating a serial number with a document prior to the workflow that generates a resulting stock transaction. This is normally a reversible process in that alternative serial numbers may be exchanged for pre-assigned ones at any time prior to creating the stock transitions.  

Pre-assignment is optional and requires that the Company-level profile setting Allow serial number assignment be activated.

Three processes may pre-assign serial numbers.  These are:

• Inwards Goods – serial numbers can be entered in Inwards Goods Receipts and then recalled for processing during Inwards Goods Costing.

• Sales Orders – serial numbers can be entered at time of Sales Order Entry and then recalled for processing during supply.

• Stock Transfer Requests – when stock is moved to the In Transit location using the Send button (creates stock transactions) then if the pre-assignment profile is set, the selected serial numbers are tagged as assigned to the Request document until received into the destination location.  This ensures that only the sent serials are processed on during the Receive process. This is especially useful where serials for a stock item may exist in the in-transit location for multiple transfer requests at any given time. On using the Receive button, the tagged list of in-transit serials is recalled for easy processing.

Pre-assignment has no effect on free stock levels or other stock calculations. By associating a serial with a document, the user can:

• Create a serial number record prior to actual stock transaction processing.

• Tag a serial to a particular document so that it is unavailable for selection on any other document.

• Allow rapid recall of the pre-assigned list at time of generating the stock transaction.

Note: The true document class link fields are not updated until a stock transaction is processed. In this way, if a serial participates more than once for a given document class (e.g. returned item sold on a subsequent Sales Order), the original link is not lost until overridden by the new stock transaction. De-assigning a serial number thus restores the history condition that existed previous to assignment.

Pre-assignment is determined from the serial number property ISASSIGNED, which can be one of the following values:

• N - not assigned

• i - Inwards Goods (Supplier)

• o - Sales Order (Customer)

• q - Stock Transfer Requests (Internal)

• r - (Reserved for future use)

Note: These values are case-sensitive.

An assigned serial number will also have header and line level links in a pair of fields designated for this purpose. These are separate from the links associated with the particular document class. The assigned links have indeterminate values when ISASSIGNED = 'N' (i.e. they are not cleared after use). If using assignment links in Clarity then the query must explicitly test the ISASSIGNED field for the correct letter associated with the document class.

Bills of Materials

EXO Business provides some additional support for serial numbers when processing Bills of Materials.

The BILLCODE is stored in the field STOCK_SERIALNOS.KITCODE for participating serial numbers.

There is no logic to correlate or link output serial numbers to component serial numbers. In other words, the individual component numbers for an individual serial number of an output stock item is not determinable where the output quantity is greater than one. Serial numbers, both component and output, can be determined for a document.

When a bill of material is embedded within another document (e.g. Sales Order or Debtors Invoice) then the BOM type is relevant to the serialised actions taken:

• A BOM of type "Kit" sells the component directly and does not manufacture an output item. A serial number will therefore not be requested for the OUTPUTCODE. The component lines are true sales lines and therefore serial numbers will be requested only if the stock item’s serial type contains the debtor attribute.

• A BOM of type "Build" (manufactured) involves two simultaneous processing functions: manufacture (internal attribute) and sale (Debtor attribute).  Serial numbers will be requested for items (both components and output) that have either internal and/or Debtor attributes.  

If EXO Business were to apply exact rules of definition, then a BOM of type "Build" should theoretically not request serial numbers for components which do not contain the internal attribute (e.g. such as those marked Debtor only). This was deemed contrary to popular expectation where serial numbers for components of a manufactured item are often listed on the debtor invoice for documentation purposes only, even though the output item is the only stock code that is participating in the sale process.

The parent supply or invoice processes do not check for discrete multiples of a BOM across all components. For example, manufacturing five units where each require a component quantity of three does not enforce the supply or invoice quantities of that component to be a multiple of three. The row count for serials requested will simply derive from the supply or invoice quantities entered (as per a non-BOM line). Pre-assignment also works in the usual way.