Pocket PC Inventory Software and Bar Code Scanner

Rev 8/26/2008

System Requirements

FloorManager/JobRunner 6.5V50 or later

PS Extras must be installed on the PC generating the Inventory Export Files.

Pocket PC Inventory Software and Bar Code Scanner

Before attempting to use the hand held inventory scanner it is important to first review proper procedures on inventory receiving and delivering. In typical warehouse environment it is important to establish a staging area for both incoming and outgoing inventories. When inventory is received, it should remain in the staging area until all receiving is complete in Pacific Solutions and inventory tags have been adhered to the product. Once this is complete the inventory items can be moved from the staging area to the racks. Conversely, it is equally important to place outbound inventory in the staging area. A few days before a job, print the picking ticket related to any specific job and use the picking ticket to pull related inventories from the rack area and place it in the staging area. Before the inventory items leave the warehouse, return to the electronic picking ticket in Pacific Solutions and deliver the materials in the computer. For inventory to properly track, it is imperative that the quantity of product being delivered in the computer matches the physical quantity leaving the warehouse. Adhering to the above procedures will be the first step in reconciling physical inventory with what Pacific Solutions software reports is on hand. It is also important to understand when inventory financially enters and leaves Pacific Solutions compared to when inventory physically enters and leaves the software. The financial quantity is increased (Inventory Asset Debited) when an Accounts Payable voucher is accepted (A/P Credited). The financial quantity is relieved when the same inventory item is invoiced from a Sales Agreement (Inventory is Credited, Sales is Debited and Cost of Sale is Debited) Physical inventory is entirely controlled by the receiving and delivering of inventory. Rather than waiting until the end of a fiscal period, it is recommended to periodically cycle count the physical inventory. FloorManager/JobRunner allows you to find on hand inventory by; Product Type, Bin Locations, Warehouse Location, etc. This enables you to decide when and what to count. Simply find the desired inventory and export the data to the Pocket PC.

These instructions assume you have installed Microsoft Active sync software on your Desktop PC and have successfully synchronized the Pocket PC with your Desktop PC. Once this has been completed successfully, you will see the following screen.

Next, click the Explore button to browse the files on the Pocket PC.

Locate and double click the My Windows Mobile-Based Device Icon.

Now, double click the Program Files Folder. Inside of this, you will see the Folder Named Inventory. Double click that folder to view its contents.

Inside this folder you will see two .csv files. One is your list of default bin locations (Bins.csv) and the other is the data you will export from Pacific Solutions (Data.csv) Return to FloorManager/JobRunner and enter the Inventory Module.

The next step is to find the inventory that you wish to count.

Rather than finding all inventories, it is recommended that you find either by a Bin Location or by a Product Type. If you are using multiple hand held devices you can isolate which inventory that will be sent to each device using the find routine before exporting; since FloorManager/JobRunner only exports on hand quantities from the found set of records. Once the desired inventory items have been isolated, you will see a list view of those products.

In the example above we located four inventory records. Notice that two of them have an on hand quantity greater than Zero and two have no on hand

quantity. Next locate the export button at the top of the list view layout and click it once.

Now you will see the dialog box shown above. Click the PDA button and FloorManager/JobRunner will create a data.csv file and save it to your desktop. This export routine will only include inventory items from the found set with an on hand quantity greater than zero.

Once you have located the data.csv file, simply drag the file from the desktop to the Inventory Folder on the Pocket PC.

The computer will ask if you want to replace the existing file. Answer yes.

Important Note: Once the files have been replaced on the Pocket PC you will need to perform a soft reset for the changes to take effect.

The next step is to click on the Start Menu on the top left corner of the Pocket PC.

A Pocket PC displays the last 5 used programs in the quick start menu. In the example above you can see the Inventory program listed. If it is not listed, you may need to go to the Programs folder and select the Inventory program from inside the folder. The next time you use the Inventory software, it will be displayed in the quick start menu. Note: It is also important to make sure your Socket Scan Driver is running. Enter the Program folder again and locate the Socket Scan folder.

Double click that folder and you will see the following choices.

Click the Socket Scan Icon highlighted above.

Next, return to the Inventory Program and let’s review the tabs at the top of the screen. From left to right, they are Form, List, Find, Count and Setup.

Form View The Pocket PC can be used for Counting Physical Inventory but it can also be used as a “Mobile Database” of your on hand inventory. If the device is being used for reference purposes only, the “Form View” shows you the current quantity, Sell Price, and Verifies the style and color of the item along with the Date the item was originally received. List View

This list simply shows you the list of all inventories you found in your search criteria. You can scroll left and right, and up and down. You can also widen the columns by dragging on the column dividers. Clicking on a line will take you to the detailed Form View for that inventory record.

Find

Finding inventory products on the Pocket PC is very similar to finding products in FloorManager/JobRunner. Any of the fields displayed above can be used to define your search criteria. Any field which has a downward arrow is a drop down menu. Notice the Product ID field, and the Inventory Field is grey in color. When you click on the Product ID Field, a soft keypad pops up which allows you to quickly enter the product ID code.

Clicking on the Inventory number pulls up a similar keypad which allows you to quickly type in an inventory record number.

Clicking on fields such as Sidemark will cause the Pocket PC’s soft keypad to appear.

Count If inventory tags have been printed from FloorManager/JobRunner it will increase the speed of finding items when counting.

When you are counting inventory, you are looking for a specific inventory record in the Pocket PC which is matched to a specific inventory number generated by FloorManager/JobRunner. You can locate the specific record by:

1. Manually searching for the inventory number by clicking on the inventory number field.

2. Manually searching by other criterion. 3. Scanning the inventory number on the bar code tag by simply pushing the

on screen “Scan Tag” button on the Pocket PC with your finger. This will cause the Socket Scanner to become active and it will quickly locate the inventory record.

Once the record is located, you will see a confirmation of the data as shown in the example above. The Quantity Field is purposely left blank. Once the true physical quantity is measured, counted and verified, simply click either the FI button or the UN button. FI stands for Feet/Inches and UN stands for Units.

If you are measuring roll goods, you click the FI button to enter the measured length.

Put the lineal footage in the Feet Field, and the remaining inches in the Inches field. You can also update the branch and bin location on this screen. When finished, simply click the Update button and move on to the next record.

Setup For companies which are counting area rugs, the default quantity each time a rug tag is scanned will be “1” In this setup area you can specific this default quantity for rapid counting of inventory. This default quantity will not be used for items such as roll goods, ceramic tile, padding etc. In a future release, Pacific Solutions may add password control to the Pocket PC inventory application. All future password controls will be accessible through the Setup tab.

Importing from the Pocket PC after counting After counting inventory with the Pocket PC hand held device, you will need to re-dock the Pocket PC in its cradle. Active sync will open and you will be able to browse the device.

Locate the data.csv file in the Inventory folder and drag that file back to the desktop. Important Note!: Be aware that the native file name generated by the Pocket PC is data.csv. If data.csv already resides on your desktop from another Pocket PC used in the counting process or from a previous export, dragging this file to the desktop will over write the existing file. Pacific Solutions recommends that you change your file name once you drag the files back to the PC Desktop to avoid confusion and to avoid overwritten file names.

In FloorManager or JobRunner, enter the Inventory file. Locate and click the List View button at the top of the inventory screen.

Click the Import button displayed above to browse for the correct file that you dragged over from the Pocket PC.

Browse the desktop and locate the file you placed on your desktop from the Pocket PC. Click open to import the data.

You will now be in the Adjustment Tab in the Inventory list view. Notice that the fields with a white background are the same as the General List Tab view, but there are other pink and blue fields that are part of the import routines. Let’s review the column headers: Counted Date: This indicates if the item sent to the PPC was counted. In our example two items were part of the physical count, and two were left uncounted. Counted Quantity and Difference: This column shows what was counted and what the difference is between the computer count, and the PPC count. Adjustment Date: This column shows the date you wish to impact the G/L via this Adjustment routine. Adjustment Comment: This allows a user added comment to the adjustment process. Adjustment G/L Account: This allows the user to select the desired G/L account to impact with the adjustment routine. Keep in mind that one side of this entry always impacts the Inventory Asset account with either a Debit or a Credit depending on whether or not the inventory increased or decreased with the physical count. Adjustment Error Message: This column is where the software reports adjustment errors. In our example, we are going to impact the G/L on 7/31/2008. In the example below you can see where that date was manually typed into the Adjustment Date Field.

If you want to set the date on all counted records en masse, simply click the arrow to the right of the date. You will see the following dialogue box asking if you want to set all dates to this date, or only the fields that are empty..

You can repeat the same process for the Adjustment Comment Column. For the Adjustment GL Account, you can select a different GL for each line, or select one account and update en masse.

Once you are finished modifying the lines, simply hit the Adj Inventory button at the top of the screen to complete the process.

Any items that cannot be adjusted will be isolated and an error message will display in the Error Message Column for your review.

In this case, the software is informing us that we cannot make a financial transaction or change to inventory items that have not been previously cost verified. Final Note: When counting inventory it is a good business practice to have a couple of different color stickers on hand to quickly denote which items have been counted. For example, let’s assume you have Blue Stickers and Red Stickers. Place a Blue Sticker on any tag that has been counted, and if an item is not found in inventory, place a red sticker on that tag. The Pocket PC can only count items that were known to be in physical inventory at the time data was passed to the Pocket PC. When you are finished with the inventory count, it will be necessary to find out why the items with a red sticker were not found. Most likely they were brought back into inventory and immediately racked before residing in the staging area.

Another possibility is the item lost an inventory tag. Whatever the reason, the items need to be manually keyed into FloorManager/JobRunner at the end of the inventory counting process.