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Practical guide
Purchase, receipt, stock and shipment: controlling the data
Supply control requires purchases, receipts, available stock and shipments to be linked by documents and statuses, with an owner for every change. Product availability should follow confirmed movement rather than a separate report.
- Warehouse Operations and Inventory Management
- Rozmetov: stock, collections and reconciliation
- For operations directors
In detail
A stock figure may mean physical quantity, accounting stock, reservation or availability for sale. Without an explicit definition, teams make decisions from different numbers.
Document lineage identifies where a discrepancy starts: supplier order, receipt, put-away, reservation, picking or shipment confirmation.
How it is applied
- The supplier order defines expected items, quantities and receiving conditions.
- Receipt records what was accepted and why it differs from the expectation.
- Stock is separated into available, reserved, blocked and in-transit states.
- Shipment changes availability on an agreed event and keeps the customer-order link.
Practical checklist
- Every stock state has an unambiguous definition.
- Receipt retains its supplier-order link and discrepancies.
- Reservation and shipment do not change one fact twice.
- An integration error cannot hide an unfinished document.
Scope and limits
This guide covers distribution data control, not replacement of specialist complex warehouse or transport planning. The operational boundary is agreed per project.