Acumatica WMS: Automated Picking & Packing

The bells and whistles provided by a modern warehouse management system are no longer a luxury but a necessity. As businesses continue to grow and expand, their warehousing needs become more complex. The manual management of inventory, order fulfillment, and shipping processes becomes a bottleneck that hampers efficiency and scalability.

This is where Acumatica's automated pick and pack functionality shines. By leveraging the power of automation and end-to-end integration, Acumatica enables businesses to meet customer demands faster, minimize errors, and scale efficiently. Let’s take a look at how it works.

In this video, we're going to be going over automated picking and packing operations in Acumatica. We’ll quickly talk first about how your configuration should be set up, then how to perform automated picking and packing on a mobile device.

Configuration

So before we pick let’s take a quick look at the recommended settings you should have configured to tailor the system to fit your business requirements. You can do this yourself, or enlist your VAR to help.

First, make sure that your warehouse (or warehouses) exist with the appropriate set of locations defined within each.

Next, take a look at your stock items. Make sure the items you need to pick are there.

You’ll also want to ensure that your base unit of measures, and units of measure for boxes and pallets exist, with appropriate conversion factors. That's important because when we go to the cross reference, we now see that our alternate ID's links us not only to the item itself, but also to the specific unit of measure defined in the General Tab. So this is going to be an important way for us to make sure that we get the correct quantities in our scanning operations.

You need to ensure that any packaging or boxes are set up in the system, as well.

The final configuration piece is to ensure that we've got a sales order and a shipment that have already been defined for this activity. The system will show here that somebody's already entered a sales order and created a shipment against that order.

Picking Process in Acumatica

Now, the person in the warehouse can get picking. A mobile device or scanner is a great tool to utilize for this. On a mobile device, you can go ahead and launch the Pick, Pack and Ship application. Make sure that you're in Pick mode by typing the “@pick” command.

One helpful tip: you can print these app commands onto a plastic-coated barcode sheet, that users can keep close to them. Maybe they mount it on their forklift, or their mobile device holster or belt, or even a wall or desk nearby. Then they can easily access the commands, scan them, and not have to type anything on the keyboard while they’re out moving around.

Barcode Scanning

So we're in Pick Mode now (because we typed the “@pick” command or scanned it), now we can scan or enter the shipment number here and begin the process of actually picking individual items for the order.

The first thing we'll do is scan the location’s barcode. Head to the storage location for the material, scan the location barcode that's next to that location. And then just scan the item that is being pulled. If the barcode references not only the item but also the unit of measure, then the system will convert the item quantity to the picked quantity in the base unit of measure for the item. The system then displays the pick quantity in the Pick Quantity column, and highlights the line in bold if the line has been picked partially. The line goes green if it's been picked in full.

After scanning the item’s barcode, you can then manually enter the item quantity using the quantity button, or scan another plastic-coded barcode with a stock quantity on it.

Once you've completed picking a given shipment line, you can then proceed to the next line. Repeat the process until the full picking is complete. Once it’s complete, we're going to switch over to the packing mode.

Packing in Acumatica WMS

To start the packing process, we stay in the same screen: Pick, Pack and Ship. We’re going to go ahead and enter or scan the “@pack” command. The system will prompt us for the document number which we’ll scan in. It will show us all the picked items at this point.

Next, we scan the barcode for the box ID that the items are being packed into. Choose the box that you have loaded into the system (e.g. small, medium, large). Then scan the barcode of the item that you're placing into the box, scan or enter the quantity, and then repeat that process until all the items have been registered into that box.

If it's necessary, then you can scan another box for the shipment and register that, as well. After your completed box, confirm by clicking OK. That tells the system that the box is complete, and then you can also enter the weight of the box, if that's appropriate.

Shipping in Acumatica

When you’re ready to ship, you will either click the “Confirm Shipment” button on the toolbar, or you will scan your handy plastic-coated barcode for “*confirm*shipment” (which is the same thing) and that will press the button for you.

Acumatica’s WMS empowers businesses to optimize their warehouse operations, streamline order fulfillment, and reduce costs. Embracing Acumatica as your warehouse management solution will not only improve operational efficiency but also enhance customer satisfaction, driving your business towards success in the ever-evolving marketplace. Contact us today to learn more.