Stock Reports - Stock Control

The set-up for each report follows a standard pattern as illustrated by the ‘Price Catalogue’ report.

Print Control

Up to eight report styles can be defined on your system through the CONFIG user (see the Configuration Guide). These control the length/width of page to print. The styles available are listed at the bottom right of the screen.

Data Items

Here you can select up to ten items to print across the page for each report. The data items available for selection are listed to the right of the screen – you can also, however, use the F4-Select key to select items for the report.

Sub Total on Item

Here you can select a data item to break the report and provide totals for, for example you could select to provide totals per analysis code. The item set here must also be set as the first sort item below.

Sorting Sequence

Reports are normally printed in stock code order. You may specify a different sorting sequence for a report here by giving the item numbers in the file of the data item on which you wish to sort. The first item chosen is the senior sort item, with each subsequent one being junior.

You have the option to choose an ascending sort sequence (normal choice) or descending value. You might use descending value if sorting on a numeric value.

Multi Location Stock

The OPTIONS Button

When you select to configure an application report, such as the Price Catalogue, the OPTIONS button allows you to set the paper size, font and margins of the printed output.

The layout of this screen differs slightly based on whether you have set the page size (as above) or not.Before discussing the parameters you should note the buttons available at the footer of this parameter screen.

The parameters available are:

Paper Size – select the paper size the report is to be printed to (i.e. A4).You can elect to leave this blank in which case the report is printed as per the last/default page size of the printer, however, if you do this you can only choose fixed pitch fonts – selecting a page size is mandatory to use proportional fonts. If you set a page size then the options screen re-displays with the appropriate parameters. If you leave blank then the options screen remains as above.

Default Printer Font – a font dialog is display allowing you to select as required, the default font to be used for this report. If you’ve sent the page size then all fonts are available, if you haven’t set this then only fixed pitch fonts can be assigned. You can also set bold/italic attributes and font size – note that if you haven’t set a page size then the font size option is not applicable (font is sized as per previous rules).

Default to Landscape – set to default the printed report to landscape, leave blank for usual portrait orientation. You may want to set reports such as the Sales Ledger Aged Debtors Report or the Cashbook Receipts Analysis Listing to landscape as these reports require a large amount of detail to be printed and otherwise the font size could be too small.

Show Time in Report Headings – set to include the printed time in the report headings in addition to the printed date.

Include Selection Criteria – set to print any selection criteria that were applied to the report.

Email as Text – if send this report via email this option allows you to send as a text file attachment as opposed to, if left blank, PDF.

Omit Full Page Headings – When printing a multi-page report the system repeats the headings for each page. Setting this option reduces the heading details for the second and subsequent pages allowing more record detail to be printed per page.

Default Output to Spooler – Usually, when printing a report, the default printer is the last print device used. Select this option to set the default printer as the spooler for this report. This acts only as a default and doesn’t prevent you electing to print the report instead.

Allow Change of Printer Alias – when these options are configured then it is assumed you are printing as ‘direct windows print’ and this is the alias set by default.Setting this option allows you to change the default alias at run-time to one of the list of Datafile configured printers. If you change the alias to a ‘DOS’ style alias then the page size (length/width) and font are again picked up from the Print Style Profile, although other settings such as ‘include time’ etc. remain from the OPTIONS display.

Print Negatives in Red – on selected reports, assuming you have a colour printer; it may be useful to print negative values in red. This option allows this.

The next set of parameters allows you to specify formatting and margin settings. This section is different if you set the page size earlier.If you have set the page size then you set the margins in millimetres. If you haven’t set the page size then you set margin in ‘columns’ for both portrait and landscape - the appropriate settings being used based on the orientation of the output selected at run-time.

Paper Size Set

Characters Per Line – the system displays the width of the report items on the right.If you leave this value at 0 (recommended) then the report width used in determining the start column positions of data items (as discussed above with regards to font size) is the larger of either the report print items or 80 columns. You can manually set a report width – from 64 to 255 columns. You may want to increase the number of columns on (say) a landscape report with few print items to bring the fields closer together to aid in reading.

Lines Per Page – if left at 0 (recommended) then the number of lines per page is determined by the font and page size. Alternatively you can set a number of lines per page, perhaps to give a greater gap between rows of data items.

Left Margin (mm) – set the size of the left hand margin (relative to page orientation in millimetres.

Right Margin (mm) – set the size of the right hand margin.

Top Margin (mm) – set the size of the top margin.

Bottom Margin (mm) – set the size of the bottom margin.

Paper Size Not Set

Minimum Characters Per Line – the system displays the width of the report items to the right. If you leave this value as 0 then the report width is the larger of either the report print items or 80 characters. You can manually set a report width – from 64 to 255 characters wide – but if you set a width less than the items actually printed then this is overridden by the report width at run-time.

Maximum Lines Per Page – if left at 0 then when printing a report the system will determine the number of lines per page based on the report width and the printable area of the page up to a maximum of 72 lines per page in portrait mode or 50 lines per page in landscape mode. Alternatively you can set the number of lines per page, from 16 to 255, and this is then taken into account when deciding font size to ensure that number of lines is printed. If left at 0 then when sending to the spooler the lines per page is assumed to be 72 in portrait mode and 50 in landscape. If you require an identical print from the printer and the spooler then a maximum number of lines should be set.

Left Margin – set the number of characters to be used as a margin from 1 to 64.If you require a margin then when entering the value you need to take into account the report print width – a margin of 4 characters on an 80-character report will be bigger than a margin of 4 characters on a 132-character report. If left at 0 no left margin is applied.

Right Margin – if you require a margin to be applied on the right of the report set the number of characters accordingly (again 1-64), if leave as 0 then no right margin is applied.

Top Margin – set the number of lines to leave as a margin at the top of the page (1-32 lines). If left at 0 then no top margin is applied.

Bottom Margin – set the number of lines to leave as a margin at the bottom of the page (1-32 lines). If left at 0 then no bottom margin is applied.

Finally, you can set default options that are used when you send the report to print or e-mail.

Print Device – if using a stand-alone Datafile system then you can set a default printer to output to. This option only applies when sending to a print device; if last printer was spooler or fax then this remains the default. If using a networked Datafile system then you can still set this where you are printing to a networked printer – provided all terminals have a consistent device path.If the print device isn’t valid then the normal printer is offered instead.

E-mail Address – if the report is sent to email then here you can enter an email address that is to be used by default for this report – though it can be amended at run-time.

Once you’ve set the desired parameters select SAVE option to apply for this and future prints.

Price Catalogue

This report is used to produce a price list for stock codes; it would normally include the stock code, description and one or more of the prices.

Stock Valuation

This report is used to produce a stock valuation listing. Up to ten items can be specified but special processing options are assigned to the ninth and tenth items. The ninth item is used for the item to be valued (normally physical quantity) and the tenth for the price at which it is to be valued (normally the cost price).

Report FIFO Values

If FIFO values set to be recorded within Stock System Profiles then this report additionally has an option to report the FIFO breakdown.

Stock Listing

This report lists all records in the stock file, and is usually for internal use only and can be configured to meet your specific requirements.

Checking Sheet

This report is intended for stock taking. Usually only the stock code, description and issue unit are included on the report.When printed this report is double-spaced to allow recording of physical stock levels.

Excess Stock

Stock Items deemed as being in excess are printed in this report (see definition of ‘excess’ in the user instructions section for this report). Typically this report includes the stock code, description, physical quantity, estimated usage, and last transaction date.

Slow Moving Stock

This report prints all stock records for which there have been no movements (in or out) for longer than the number of days specified in the stock System Profiles. Typically this report includes the stock code, description, physical stock, last transaction date and the physical value.

Out of Stock

This report includes stock item for which the stock is either zero or negative. Typically includes the re-supply details of supplier, cost price and re-order quantity in addition to the stock code and description.

Potential Out of Stock

There are two criteria for inclusion in this report:

Free Stock or Physical (whichever is lower) is compared against the minimum stock level. If the minimum is greater then the stock item is included.

Usage is multiplied by lead time to establish the quantity required during the lead time. If this is greater than either physical or free (again whichever is the lower of the two) then the stock item is included. If either the usage or lead time is zero then this criteria is not applied.

Again this report would typically include the re-supply details of supplier, cost price and re-order quantity in addition to the stock code and description.

Analysis Summary

This report analyses the stock records by either the sales or purchase analysis code typically showing the value of stock for each analysis code. For this report the only configuration options are the print style and the following:

Analyse Which Data Item

This is the quantity item to use – typically this is physical but you may want to use free-stock instead.

At Which Value Data Item

This is the value item to use – typically this is the cost price but you may want to use a selling price instead.

Stock Take

This report is printed during the Stock Take procedure to highlight discrepancies between the counted quantity and the quantity recorded as physical stock on the computer.Typically you display the stock code, description, counted quantity, compare quantity (saved physical at start of stock take process) and the discrepancy qty.

If using Batch Tracking a second page asks you to configure the items to display for the batch tracking details. This has an initial question to ‘copy’ the stock layout where, if set, the display items for the stock file are replicated for the batch print details – you can set your own details as required though.