Our experience is similar to
@Victor Diercksen.
<NOTE: we are retail ... but have a lot of different things we do based on the store / customer interaction>
For the TRUE special order (IE I am ordering you a custom widget from a vendor for a customer) this works great. We can link the SO to the PO, add some customization / alerting when that product shows up to put it aside for you instead of selling it, etc. In that sense reservations work fantastic and have a huge process benefit for us.
You can link a sales order line to an incoming PO line. Same idea as the use case above - this helps us set stock aside for you upon receipt.
The lumber yard is a very different beast. We've got trucks rolling in and out all day, every day. Reserving against PO's or inventory in such a fluid area would never work for us. IE if you have committed orders going 3 weeks out and 3 trucks coming in with full loads between then and now doesn't mean I can't fill an order today if the stock is reserved for an order in 2 weeks. There isn't a need in that area to create more (virtual) paperwork and we would rather just use views to handle what is and isn't capable to fill.
NAV does add limitations to what you can do on a sale. IE: you cannot sell a sales line that has a reservation against a PO line - it needs to be received. NAV adjusts / recalculates things if you adjust the PO / SO. Adjusting expected receipt date on a PO can remove a reservation. If a vendor can't fill the order then it's a manual update of the reservation entry on the SO to the new PO.
My suggestion is open up the Cronus (or a test) database and try your business processes against it. It may work perfectly for you, it may change some processes (for better or worse or just different), and it may break your staff.
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Patrick Hulst
Retail Applications Projects Manager
Home Hardware Stores Limited
St Jacobs ON
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Original Message:
Sent: 02-12-2019 11:17 AM
From: Victor Diercksen
Subject: Reservations
Hello,
I have tried using reservations a couple of times in the past and it never seems to work. The functionality is solid, the problem is that sales and customer service make a lot of 'exceptions' outside of the standard business policies that are impossible to manage if you start using reservations.
The result is that it is extra work to make the reservation, then it is also extra work to reverse the reservation and apply it to a different customer when they want/need to do so. Eventually they just gave up using reservations.
What I find works better is to modify the Item Availability calculation. Instead of calculating quantity on hand minus open sales orders, you should look at your lead time by item and calculate 'Quantity on Hand' - Open Sales Orders (Within your lead time)+scheduled deliveries within your lead time.
Example: Quantity on Hand = 100
Open Sales Orders (today plus 2 weeks)= 95
Scheduled PO Deliveries (today plus 2 weeks) = 25
Net available to ship in the next two weeks = 30. This is what appears on the sales line as you are entering the sales order.
This assumes that it takes 2 weeks to replenish product from your vendor for this item.
Victor
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Victor Diercksen
Director of Inspirational Technology
Mity Inc.
Sandy UT
Original Message:
Sent: 02-11-2019 09:32 AM
From: Chris Soraparu
Subject: Reservations
Has anyone been using reservations? If so, how do you like using this function in NAV? Have you run into any obstacles or are there any downsides to using this function?
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Chris Soraparu
Tri Star Metals LLC
Carol Stream IL
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