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Serving Retailers since 2000                       Newsletter
 December 2012
In This Issue
Physical Inventory
Tools
Reports
Quick Links...

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Greetings!

With the end of year coming up, it's almost time for that least-favorite habit of the year:  the Physical Inventory.  In this issue, we remind you of all the tools available to our users for dealing with this.

As a reminder, we will be closed on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Year's Day.
Physical Inventory    

Doing a physical inventory can be a very stressful time.  A quick review of the basics of doing it can help, however.  A more detailed explanation may be found in the manual; to access it from within the program on the main invoice screen go to the help menu and then ExtremePOS Help.  For Praiz and Musicware users, this is Praiz Help or Musicware Help respectively.

1.  Start eXtremePOS and select Tools -> Physical Inventory -> Desktop from the login screen to enter the Physical Inventory screen.

2.  Select the department(s) you want to inventory. To inventory your entire store, select "All" from the Department list box. To select multiple departments, hold down the "Control" key and click each department you want to select.

Note: While taking Physical Inventory, ExtremePOS will only recognize and count items in the selected departments.
Click the OK button. This will create a Physical Inventory database

IMPORTANT: You will need to COMPLETE inventory in the selected departments before you update quantities to your store database. At that point, you will be able to go back and select other
department(s) to inventory.

3. You should select "Continue Counting" to bring up the Count screen and begin taking inventory. Select "View Depts" if you want to see a list of departments currently being inventoried.

4. Collect inventory from the Count Screen
    In order to count an item:
    1. Enter the quantity in the Quantity box
    2. Indicate whether this is a new or used item by selecting the appropriate option button.
   3. Scan the item OR type in the item number and hit OK Information about the item including expected and actual quantities for new and used will be shown in the "Last Item Scanned" box. When you have completed taking inventory, exit the Count screen by selecting "Done".

5. View Discrepancy Report
Select View or Print inventory discrepancy report to see all differences between expected and actual quantities, and value of any lost inventory.
Note: When quantities are updated, the final discrepancy report will be automatically saved to your store data directory under Backup\Reports. The filename will be based on the date and time the report was created. The program will inform you of the location and filename that the final report is saved to.

6. Update Quantities
Selecting "Update Inventory" will overwrite the quantities in your store database with the counted quantities in your physical inventory database. Update should not be performed until you have COMPLETELY inventoried the departments you have selected. Quantities will be updated ONLY for the departments which you have inventoried during this session. It is recommended that you view the discrepancy report one last time before updating quantities to verify that you are ready to perform the
update. When the update is performed, it CANNOT be undone. If you find you need to adjust the quantities after you have already performed the update, you will need to do this at the inventory
maintenance screen.

If you wish for any reason to discard the inventory taken thus far, select "Clear Physical Inventory Count". This will delete the quantities and allow you to restart inventory from scratch. This is
primarily helpful if you are experimenting with the software rather than actually taking inventory. Be aware that once you select "Clear Physical Inventory Count", it CANNOT be undone.
Physical Inventory Tools 


The above process can be done with just your standard wired scanner at your point of sale station.  However, we do offer tools to make the process easier, possibly allowing you to do it more frequently and therefore keep a tighter control on your inventory.

First, instead of a normal, wired scanner, you can use a bluetooth-based wireless scanner. This device can go up to 328 feet away within your store and act as a scanner for your desk; you can also use it as a normal scanner the rest of the time.  However, you'll need someone watching the computer for any errors (such as the item you've scanned not being set up in inventory, or not in the department you're working with) and you won't be able to use both it and a normal scanner on the same station at the same time. We sell this device for $499.99

The other mobile option is a specialized batch scanner and mobile terminal that can be used to collect a large number of scans and then upload them all together to the inventorying station.  You can use these at the same time as the station's own scanner, and at any distance or even in other buildings. In fact, while collecting the data the pos system doesn't even have to be on. You may also, for larger stores, have several in use at any time for an even quicker inventory process.  These do not have the capability to work as normal scanners, however.  They are about the size of a cell phone and run off of normal AAA batteries.  These devices cost $599.99 normally, but are on sale for $499.99 through the end of the year.
Inventory Reports     

Remember that there is no way to run an inventory report for a past date, other than having a backup of the system for that time.  Make certain you run and export or print an inventory list report, both new and used if applicable to your store, at the end of the last day this year or the beginning of the first day next year.

As with all reports that appear in the report viewer, you may export using the button in the top left corner to a variety of formats, including PDF and Excel.

For customers on an update plan, the most recent version of the software is 3.00.0003.  We will be closed on Monday, December 24th for Christmas Eve, Tuesday, December 25th for Christmas, and Tuesday, January 1st for New Year's Day. 

 

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You may view an archive of our emails here! 

Sincerely,
 

Jeremy Spencer
Support Manager
Extreme Point Of Sale Inc
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