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This clip demonstrates the tools available in Priority for setting up parts in the system
and for keeping track of their availability and demand. The main tool for managing all
your parts is the Part Catalogue, which provides comprehensive information about the item,
encompassing sales, purchase and inventory data. We'll cover this near the end of the
clip. Let's begin by setting up a new part in the system.
Open the Part Catalogue form from the Inventory > Part Catalogue menu. Assign the new item
a Part Number. You can assign the number according to any numbering strategy employed in your
business. In this demonstration, I'll use a simple number, ABC123. Also write a Description.
If the full description is too long to fit, write a brief one here and use the Parts -- Remarks
sub-level form to record the full description, which will appear when printing documents
in the extended part description format. Upload an image of the item in question by
right-clicking the folder icon and selecting Import. This image will appear in printouts
of documents containing the item, such as price lists, when the appropriate format is
selected. In the Additional Details tab, define the
part Type. Select "P" for a make item, "R" for a buy item, or "O" for other. The default
for new parts is R, and I'll leave it as is. The default unit assigned to new parts, as
both their Buy/Sell Unit and their Factory Unit, is "ea," that is, "each". In other words,,
whether sold, purchased or manufactured, the item is measured in single units. When you
first record the part in the form, you can change this to units indicating weight, length,
or any other appropriate unit of measure, as long as you don't leave the record. Press
F1 to read more in-depth help for this column, or any other.
Newly defined parts are flagged automatically in the Inventory Control column. Remove this
flag if the item in question is not subject to inventory control. For example, you would
do so when defining a "work hour" part used for charging customers by the hour. You can
also flag the Maintain Serial Nos, often used for electronic items. If you want to allow
users to change the part description in specific documents, flag the Change Desc. column.
Let's move to the Details tab. The item is automatically assigned to the default Part
Family. Press F6 and delete the default family to display the full list of defined part families,
from which you can choose the relevant family. The Barcode column is filled in automatically
with the Part Number you recorded, and can be revised as needed. You can also specify
a Pref. Vendor. In the Prices & Costs tab, let's record the
List Price, that is, the price of the item in the Base price list; and its Std. Cost.
The cost recorded here will appear by default in sales and purchasing documents containing
the item. In the Specs and More Specs tabs, you can
assign various specifications to the part, which you have already defined in the Definition
of Part Specs form. For example, I have defined Spec 1 as "Material" and populated the Choose
list with possible values. You can define a message that will automatically
appear when the part is recorded in a document, in the Part Remarks for Internal Use sub-level
form. If the item is a manufactured or assembled
part, use the Child Parts sub-level form to create a bill of materials. All the child
parts making up the parent part must first be defined in the system.
Now, let's define additional data for the item in other related forms: Move the cursor
back to the Part Number column, and from the list of Direct Activations, select Financial
Parameters for Parts. Note that the details of the item have been filled in automatically.
In the Shipping Expenses tab, determine the Shipping Cost Type and cost percentages.
If the item you defined is a virtual part used for calculating shipping expenses, use
the Burden Type column to determine how shipping costs will be distributed among shipped items.
This form can also be used to revise the Accounting Family to which the part belongs, which determines
the income account, expense account, and profit center to which transactions for this part
will be recorded. Let's move back to the Part Catalogue form
by pressing Esc or by selecting the form name in the Form Navigation box at the top right
corner. From the list of Direct Activations, choose the Inventory Parameters for Parts
form. Here, you can choose the Packing Crate Code that will appear by default for this
item in all sales documents. In the Order Tolerance column, define the
percentage by which the received or shipped amount of this item can exceed the original
order quantity. You can also record a number or percentage in the Close Order Tolerance
columns indicating the permitted deviation from the original order quantity that allows
it to be closed automatically. These definitions apply to both sales and purchase orders.
In the Service tab, you can select the Warranty Code of the type of warranty usually given
to customers who buy this item. Now let's return to the Part Catalogue form.
After a part has been set up and various transactions have been recorded for it, the Part Catalogue
form is useful for following up on vital data. Let's see a few useful examples for an existing
item. For this purpose, I'll retrieve an item prepared in advance.
The Inventory for Part sub-level form displays inventory levels of the item in company warehouses.
In the Part Availability sub-level form, you can see the projected availability of the
item, taking into consideration existing inventory levels, open purchase orders, and open sales
orders. You can see details of the orders in question in the next sub-level form.
Details of the latest inventory transactions involving the item appear in the Recent Inventory
Transactions and Recent Entries into Inventory sub-level forms. The ITransDays constant determines
the number of days to be displayed in both forms. Additional sub-level forms help you
manage the part; you can read a detailed help text by right-clicking the name of the form.
In addition to information found in the sub-level forms of the Part Catalogue, you can run a
wide variety of reports from the Part Reports menu. You can use the Part Catalogue Report
Generator , to define customized reports based on almost any item attribute, such as price,
cost, part specifications, part family and so on. From the Inventory Transaction Reports
menu, you can run reports displaying detailed transactions or summaries of transactions.
For example, the Inventory Journal for Warehouse report displays a list of inventory transactions
involving the item, including a link to each document, whether it be a purchase order,
a warehouse transfer, a shipping document and so on.
Part Maintenance Finally, there are two useful programs that
help with part maintenance: • The Delete Parts program allows you to
delete parts, provided they have not been linked to other records in the system;
• and the Change Part Unit program allows you to change buy/sell units, factory units,
or both for one or more designated parts. This change is possible only if the conversion
ratio between the original unit and the new one is 1.
This concludes our presentation of setting up and maintaining parts in Priority.