It doesn’t matter how futuristic and efficient your inventory is, inventory counting and tracking are important for every warehouse. They are the key factors in optimizing production, determining profit, purchasing inventory before it runs out, and preventing any shrinkage. Doing all this manually, using traditional methods, can take a lot of time and is susceptible to errors as well.
SAP Business One provides inventory counting and tracking feature which is not only easy to perform but efficient as well. Inventory tracking in SAP B1 can be done by going to the Inventory > Inventory Transactions > Inventory Counting Transactions menu. You can initiate dynamic inventory tracking in SAP B1 for single or multiple counters through the Inventory Counting window.
Today, in this article, we will look at how you can create Inventory Counting Documents in SAP Business One and import the counting results manually or from Microsoft Excel.
Creating Inventory Counting Documents
There are two ways of creating inventory counting documents—you can either import the results from Microsoft Excel or enter the counting results manually. We’ll explain both processes here:
Importing Counting Results from Microsoft Excel
Follow the procedure explained below:
Step 1: Prepare an appropriate import template:
- 1. Go to the SAP Business One Main Menu. Select Inventory > Inventory Transactions > Inventory Counting Transactions > Inventory Counting.
- 2. Define the counting type in the Inventory Counting window. The fields in the import template will differ as per your counting type.
- 3. Click on the Add Items button and then choose Import Items.
- 4. Select the relevant fields in the Import from Excel window according to the information you want to verify.
- 5. Save the template by clicking on the Save As button. You’ll need to define the template code and name in the Save As Data Import Template window. Once done, click on the Save button.
Step 2: Open Microsoft Excel and based on the template defined above, create a spreadsheet. Fields must be defined in the same order as they were in the template.
Step 3: Fill the spreadsheet with your counting results and then save it in a Tab-delimited, Unicode, or MS-DOS TXT format. Please note that the Macintosh TXT format is not supported.
Step 4: Import the counting results to SAP Business One. To do that:
- 1. Go to the Inventory Counting window.
- 2. Specify the counters and define the counting type.
- 3. Select the Add Items button and then click on Import Items.
- 4. Go to the Import from the Excel window. Select the Browse button beside the Use Data Template and choose the template defined in Step 1.
- 5. Select the Update Existing Records checkbox if you want to update the existing records and have only entered a part of your counting results.
- 6. Not selecting the checkbox will import all your data into the spreadsheet. The system will show an error if existing records and the imported data contain the same item while you’re trying to add the inventory counting document.
- 7. Select the Check Import File for Errors checkbox to perform a pre-check on your spreadsheet. This is an optional step.
- 8. Click on the OK button.
- 9. Select the TXT file that stores the counting results in the Open window and then choose the Open button. Your counting results will be imported by the system into the Inventory Counting window.
Step 5: Make any adjustments necessary to the counting results.
Step 6: Choose the Counted checkbox for each completed row.
Step 7: Choose the Add button the save the counting results in SAP Business One. You can select the Update button for an existing inventory counting document.
Manually Entering Counting Results
Here’s how to enter counting results in the inventory counting document manually:
Step 1: Navigate to Inventory > Inventory Transactions > Inventory Counting Transactions > Inventory Counting from the SAP Business One Main Menu. It’ll open the Inventory Counting window.
Step 2: Define the count date and time.
Step 3: Define the counting type and add counters. You would have to define team counters and individual counters separately if you’ve selected Multiple Counters for the counting type. An additional Team Counting tab will appear if there is any team counter.
Step 4: Add items and specify their storage locations. This can be done either manually or based on specific selection criteria. To define a selection criterion, you can select the Add Items button and choose Select Items. Then you can specify the different selection criteria in the Inventory Counting-Items Selection Criteria window.
Step 5: Enter the quantities of counted items along with other information like Serial numbers, Batches, and Counted quantity of each Unit of Measure if it is defined for an item.
Step 6: Select the Counted checkbox for each row that is finished and ready for posting. Failing to do this will prevent the counting results to be posted. By double-clicking the Counted column header, you can select all the checkboxes at once.
Step 7: Click on the Add button to add the document and save the counting results.
Inventory counting in SAP is available for SAP Business One version 9.0 or higher. It is compatible with SAP’s HANA platform or the MS SQL platform.
Also Read: SAP Business One on MS SQL vs. HANA – A Detailed Comparison
If you are an existing SAP Business One customer or are looking to implement SAP Business One for inventory counting or management system, Praxis Info Solutions has deep domain experience working with different clients and can help you achieve the kind of efficiency you require.
Our team of skilled and talented professionals has worked on several systems and is committed to your end goal. We ensure that our solutions are easy to understand and that you can use them daily for inventory tracking in SAP B1 or any other SAP project. We have a proven track record of collaborating with multiple companies across several domains like FMCG, Manufacturing, and Distribution & Services in different geographies.