37.    Commsn Method

1 alphabetic character.

If calculate commission type is by item in Customer Order Processing then this field determines how the commission is calculated for each item.  The commission method must be one of the following:

A      =   Amount

C      =   % of Cost

M      =   % of Margin

P      =   % of Price  

This field defaults to P.

38.    Commsn Pct/Amt

7 digit numeric file with 2 decimal places (99,999.99) 

This is the commission percent or amount for this item.  If the commission method is C, M, or P, enter the commission percent given for this item. The commission percent can not be greater than 100%.  If the commission method is A, enter the commission amount given for this item.

39.    Target Margin

3 numeric digits (999).

This is the targeted profit margin for the item, calculated by comparing the profit made by selling the item to the item's cost.  For example, if the cost of an item is $5.00 and its selling price is $8.00, the percent of profit would be: (8 ‑ 5) / 5 = 60%.  You should enter the profit margin you wish to obtain for the item.

This field is printed on the Sales Comparison Reports in the Customer Order Processing package.

40.    Matl Cost Type

1 alphanumeric character.

Enter the item's material cost type.  It is up to you to define valid material cost types using Material Cost Type File Maintenance.  This field will be used to define this item's inventory asset account.  This field defaults to the default material cost type in I/M Setup. 

Press the F7 key to search for Material Cost Type.

41.    Reorder Level

A standard quantity format 

When the quantity of the item on‑hand falls below the reorder level, an order should be placed for the item.

This could be performed via the Create Unreleased Purchase Order's By Vendor application, if you wish.

The reorder level is calculated by adding the amount of stock you want to keep on hand for sudden emergency demands (safety stock) to the amount of stock you expect to use during the time it takes to receive a new supply from the vendor or from the manufacturing facility.

This reorder level is recalculated by the package whenever the Recalculate Reorder Fields application is run.

If this field is left at zero, it will be calculated on the first run of the Recalculate Reorder Fields application.

42.    Order Up To

A standard quantity format.

This is the maximum quantity of the item that it is desirable to have in stock.  This quantity would be equal to the reorder point plus the order quantity. The order up to level is usually used in a periodic review system in which the quantity on‑hand is inspected visually, and if it is low, enough is ordered to bring the on‑hand back to the order up to level.

43.    Recom Min Order

A standard quantity format.

This is the absolute minimum, which should be ordered at one time.  It is equal to the amount of stock that will be consumed during the time it takes to obtain new supplies from the vendor or from the manufacturing facility.  If only this amount were ordered, you would usually find yourself having to place a new order for the item as soon as the new supply arrived.  Thus, you would normally order more than this recommended minimum order.  The amount of the recommended minimum order is recalculated every time the Recalculate Reorder Fields application is run.  If this field is left at zero, it will be calculated on the first run of the Recalculate Reorder Fields application.

44.    Lead Time

3 numeric digits (999).

This is the number of calendar days, which pass between the ordering of a new supply of the item and the actual receipt of the item into stock.

If this field is left at zero, the Recommended Minimum Order field will always be set to zero by the Recalculate Reorder Fields application.

45.    Def Vendor No

6 alphanumeric characters 

The default or main vendor from which the item is purchased.  It is important to enter a vendor number here if the I/M Create Unreleased PO's By Vendor application will be used to automatically generate purchase orders.

Press the F7 key to search by vendor number or the F8 key to search by vendor name.

46.    Order Minimum

A standard quantity format.

In many cases, there is a minimum quantity of the item, which can be purchased from the vendor.  For example, if the item only comes in cases, at least one case must be purchased.  If a case consisted of 50 of the items, then this field would have the value of 50.

47.    Order Multiple

4 numeric digits (9999).

The item should be ordered in multiples of this quantity.  For example, this order multiple might be the quantity per case. 

This field defaults to 1.

48.    Commodity Code

4 alphanumeric characters.

This is a user‑defined code, which identifies a category of items, which you purchase from some vendor.  For example, you might assign the code ST to steel products. 

The Purchase Order and Receiving package allows you to specify which vendors supply which Commodity Codes, and provides various reports based on this Commodity Code.

49.    Weight

8 numeric digits with 3 decimal places (99,999.999).

Enter the unit weight of the item.  This helps to determine the best method of shipping the item.

50.    Inventory Class

1 alphanumeric character.

A, B, or C may be entered here for the ABC Analysis code

A more detailed explanation of the ABC Analysis concept is contained in the  for Item File Maintenance.

51.    Cycle Count Code

1 alphanumeric character.

The purpose of the cycle count code is to allow you to print a Cycle Count Worksheet for those items with selected cycle count codes.  Only these items will be cycle counted.

You may define the cycle count codes to be used in your inventory system in any way you choose.

52.    Date Last Cntd

A standard date format.

This is the date a cycle count was last done for the item.

53.    Buyer Or Analyst

2 alphanumeric characters.

This is a user‑defined field designating who the main buyer or analyst for the item is. Buyers or analyst codes may be defined using the Buyer/Analyst Code File Maintenance application.

Press the F7 key to search for Buyer/Analyst.

54.    Usage Ptd

A standard quantity accumulator format with an optional minus sign.

The quantity of the item, which has been used so far this period.  This usage would have come about either as the result of shipping a quantity of the item to a customer, or by consuming the item as a component of some manufactu­ring process.  The field is updated either after the invoicing of orders in the Customer Order Processing package, by Inventory Transaction Processing, or by producing work orders in Bill Of Material Processor.

55.    Usage Ytd

A standard quantity accumulator format with an optional minus sign.

The quantity of the item, which has been used so far this year.  Refer also to the above field, Usage PTD.

56.    Usage Last Yr

A standard quantity accumulator format with an optional minus sign.

The quantity of the item, which was used last year. Refer also to the above field, Usage PTD.

57.    Average Usage

This is your projected average usage of the item in one period.  The length of the period is defined in I/M Setup.

The value of this field is recalculated every time the Recalculate Reorder Fields application is run, based on a comparison between the actual usage for the previous period and the previous value of this field.

It is important that a reasonable estimate of the average usage be entered in this field.  If this is not done, it may take several periods of recalculation before it corrects itself.  Exactly how long the self-correction will take is determined by the usage weight factor.  For example, if the usage weight factor is .29, it will take six periods before this figure is accurate.

58.    Usage Wght Fctr

3 numeric digits with 2 decimal places (9.99).

This is the alpha factor used in forecasting the next period's usage of the item, based on the actual usage for the previous period, and the forecast for that period.  It determines the number of periods of sales history to use in forecasting next period's usage.  Based on experience in the manufacturing industry, a table of alpha factors for periods of dif­ferent lengths has been drawn up for your use.

 Periods of      Usage Weighing

Sales History        Factor

     3                  .50

     6                  .29

     9                  .20

    12                 .15

    18                 .11

Usage Wght Fctr (continued)

In the calculation of a new forecast, as you use more periods of sales history, the importance placed on the previous period's actual usage decreases.  Thus a sudden change upward or downward will not produce a widely out of line forecast for next period.

If this field is left at zero, the forecast for the next period will never change, regardless of how high or low the actual usage goes.

59.    Safety Stock

A standard quantity format.

The demand for an item may vary over a period of time.  A frequently used way of ensuring that there is enough stock on hand to meet this variable demand is to always keep a supply of extra stock.  This extra stock is called safety stock.  You may enter the initial value of the safety stock field.  It will then be recalculated to reflect changes in actual usage each time the Recalculate Reorder Fields application is run.

If this field is left at zero, it will be calculated on the first run of the Recalculate Reorder Fields application.

60.    Safety Factor

2 numeric digits with 1 decimal place (9.9).

This safety factor is used in recalculating the safety stock when the Recalculate Reorder Fields application is run.  In general, the higher the safety factor is set, the higher the safety stock will be.  Thus the number of out‑of‑stock situations will decrease.

The following table of safety factors has been drawn up from experience in the manufacturing industry.  It is based on the customer service level you want to maintain.  For example, if you want to provide a customer service level of 85%, meaning that 85 out of 100 times a customer orders the item it will be in stock, you would specify the safety factor at 1.3.

Customer Service          Safety

        Level                   Factor

        50%                       0.0

        75%                       0.8

        80%                       1.1

        85%                       1.3

        90%                       1.6

Safety Factor (continued)

Customer Service          Safety

        Level                   Factor

        95%                     2.1

        97%                     2.4

        99%                     2.9

        99.5%                  3.2

        99.8%                  3.6

        99.9%                  3.9

        99.99%                   5.0

If this field is left at zero, there will not be any safety stock, so about half the time you will be out of stock.

61.    Usage Filter

2 numeric digits with 1 decimal place (9.9).

The usage filter is used during the calculation of a new forecast for the item.

If a period's actual usage is suddenly very high in comparison with the forecast, it can cause the new forecast to appear higher than it should be.  For this reason, you may want to dampen the effect of these sudden usage increases.

When calculating the new forecast, the usage figure used for the calculation is never allowed to be greater than the usage filter times the earlier forecast.  For example, if the prior forecast for an item were 1,000, this month's actual usage was 8,000 and the usage filter was 5, the usage figure used in the calculation of the new forecast would not be allowed to exceed 5,000 (5 x 1,000).  In this example, 5,000 would be the figure used for actual usage period to date in the calculation.

If this field is left at zero, no dampening will occur. If it is less than one it will force the forecasted average usage to decrease regardless of actual usage.

When initially setting up your package, if you are not certain that the Average Usage field is accurate, use a fairly high usage filter.

62.    Start Sale Date

A standard date format.

When the item is on sale, enter here the starting date of the sale, and in the next field the ending date of the sale.  If the date of the order is between these dates, the sale price will be used for the item, instead of the regular item price.  The Price Code File Maintenance application in the Customer Order Processing package allows you to enter additional pricing data for inventory items.

63.    End Sale Date

A standard date format.

Refer to the above field, the Start Sale Date.    

64.    Sale Price

10 numeric digits with 4 decimal places and an optional minus sign (999,999.9999‑).

This sale price will be used instead of the regular item price during the dates defined above.

65.    Economic Ord Qty

A standard quantity format. 

It may be beneficial to purchase this item in large enough quantities that the cost of repeatedly ordering is minimized.  At the same time, you will want to keep the dollar value of inventory as low as possible in order to minimize carrying costs.  The quantity of the item to order which best balances these factors is called the Economic Order Quantity.  This value is not calculated by the package.  You should determine, based on your experience, what this quantity should be and enter it here.

The equation is :                                                       

Where Q is the quantity to be ordered, A is the annual sales, S is the setup or ordering cost r is the carrying cost rate, and v is the item's unit cost.

66.    Serialized Item

Y or N.

If using serialized items in I/M Setup.

Enter yes here if this item will have serial numbers. 

The default answer is N.

This field cannot be changed if the quantity on order is greater than zero.

A more detailed explanation of serialized processing is contained in the  for this application.

66.    Lot Numbers ?

Y or N.

If using lot items in I/M Setup.

Enter yes here if this item will have either serial numbers or lot numbers.

The default answer is N.

This field cannot be changed if the quantity on order is greater than zero.

A more detailed explanation of serialized or lot processing is contained in the  for this application.

67.    Length Of Wrnty

3 numeric digits (999).

This field is used for serialized inventory only.  Enter the number of days the item will be under warranty after it has been sold.

68.    Do Price Breaks Apply ?

Y or N.

If this flag is set to Y, and the pricing basis (see COP Price Code File Maintenance) is D or M, the percentage set in the price code file will be applied against the specified Item sale price.  If this flag is set to Y, and the pricing basis is P, the straight Item sale price will be used.

If this flag is set to N, no price breaks will be calculated.

The default answer to this question is N.

69.    Do Discounts Apply ?