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ESC mobile invoice straight to inventory
Just wondering if there was a way to tie ESC mobile directly to inventory. Our issue is that inventory is not affected until we import the dispatch from mobile. We like to have time to review invoices before processing them so this is problematic when trying to restock service vans on a daily basis.
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Chance,
We have dispatch pull the invoices in to ESC and put them on hold. For standard work he also makes sure that the parts come from the right warehouse. For quoted or staged work, the quoter does this.
This gets the invoice into the system and the parts out of it. It also gives you a metric of how long the invoice process takes. It's amazing how involved management gets when they find out that there are 30k worth of invoices sitting there waiting for actual invoicing.
Hope this helps.
Thanks Rick,
That certainly does help.
This is a great tip as we fight this issue daily.
If there is an invoice in the mobile queue, why would the Place Invoice on Hold option not be available to use?
Curious... do you change the date on your invoice to the date when the invoice is finally sent out? Or do you keep the original import date on your invoice? Changing date of invoice changes the date any parts are removed from inventory, which totally messes with your system for inventory, especially when you do a physical count.
Julie: Our invoices go out dated the day of service completion. And yes, making sure that the invoice date and transfer dates,etc.are properly aligned is critical.
And Ben: Sorry, I must have missed your response back in July. An invoice that is in the mobile queue isn't in the system yet, so there is no way to put it on hold. Nor would it actually do anything if you could. We import the invoices to get them out of the queue and put them on hold so they don't screw up accounting (and so I can see how far behind they are). But an invoice on hold in the system does pull the parts out of inventory as of the date on the invoice.
Thanks Rick! How do you handle dispatches where you need to return to install ordered parts? Most of our customers want the diagnosis trip and repair trip on the same invoice. If we import the invoice, we can't redispatch it anymore like we used to. If I create a new dispatch and transfer the diagnosis info onto the parts tab, then I'm still not removing parts (if they used some on diagnosis trip) from inventory when they are being used. I wouldn't want to keep the old invoice on hold for fear of double billing a customer. Am I making any sense?Right now we keep invoices in mobile queue until the dispatch is complete... dispatches are moved to "Parts on Order" while waiting for parts to be delivered.
Julie,
We use a system of staging bins, which are simply ESC warehouses. So we don't complete the dispatch or do anything with the invoice, we just transfer the parts used into the staging bin, and transfer any additional parts there as well once they are received. When the job is actually complete, just invoice normally, but change the warehouse on the parts line items to the warehouse number of the staging bin.
Bear in mind that ESC mobile changes all of the warehouse numbers to the warehouse set on the mobile device, so if you have your vehicles set to separate warehouses, which you should, you'll have to change them all to the staging bin as soon as you import the invoice. (Scott, don't let the dev team forget that it would be really nice if they fixed that some day).
The 10,000 warehouses in ESC are really very useful for keeping your inventory separated. For instance, when you are getting ready to do a big job where you'll be receiving parts over a few week time period, you can transfer them to a staging bin as they arrive so they don't show as available in main stock. Also, if you physically store them in a staging area, it's less likely that someone will take the parts for their own job. It adds some overhead for doing transfers, but it's much easier to track down problems when parts go missing.
Hope this helps.
Rick,
I'm just seeing your comments from back in April. I was told by ESC that putting an invoice on hold doesn't relieve the inventory in the system. You're saying that it does. Based on the great feedback you've given on these discussion boards, it appears you're a veteran user of the system, so I appreciate you sharing that information. It certainly would have been useful had ESC shared this information correctly as it is something we have battled for a while.
Ben
Ben,
Yikes, you must have gotten a new hire. They know that on-hold invoices pull parts from stock. And it's really easy to test.
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