Warehouse Management

Steps of receiving, storing and forwarding an excellent warehouse management, inventory control, reducing risk, losses and depreciation of materials.

The purpose of warehouse management is to analyze clearly, objectively and effectively moving inventories in warehouses, respecting the following steps: (a) receipt, (b) storage and (c) expedition. Each of these steps should be well understood, to reduce organizational failures and losses for the full meeting market demands. The importance of evaluating the operation of warehouse management is related to the flow of materials throughout the supply chain. Ie, the warehouses have a strategic role, not having the function of lockers, but continuous movement, for service consumption, collaborative relationship with suppliers and integration aspects with transportation modes. The central focus is on hard work in pursuit of appropriate levels of service, taking appropriate parameters of quality, time and cost. Being stock / cash, it can not stand still, it represents equity and impacts net income of organizations. The central question is how to manage and organize optimally operational flow in warehouse management.

Warehouse management

Warehouse, storage and / or distribution centers are common words in logistics while synonymous. Despite constant doubts and misuse of terminology in the industry, the biggest challenge of the ” warehouse management ” is to organize internal processes of these sheds. Ie, there is a necessity to use the methods of total quality to highlight the current work situation, and correcting possible errors in the proposed continuous improvement. Several methods can be used, for example, the PDCA (Plan, Do, Check and action), cause and effect diagram and statistical process control, with the participation of all those involved in operational activities, encouraging integration and level great service execution. One of the serious problems of warehouse management is intertwined in perception of the organizations on the strategic importance of this ” link” in the supply chain. There is a need to implement strategic management models for long-term planning involving from control in the suppliers, the implementation of transportation, receiving materials, internal movement in storage area, through separation, in planning the expedition to volume capacity. Strategy and overall quality must go together to reduce the rates of loss, theft, depreciation, storage failure and excellent service to consumer demands. Technically, a warehouse ‘s main momentary custody for further external material handling function. But companies insist on managing their inventory anyway, without the use of qualitative and quantitative tools of control. In the books of logistics, for example, in ” Business Logistics: Process Integration Supply Chain, Donald Bowersox, 2001 Atlas Press ” or ” Business Logistics: Transportation, Materials Management, Physical Distribution, Ronald Ballou, 1993 Atlas Press “theme Warehouse Management receives the title of ” Internal Logistics and Manufacturing. ” But what would ” Internal Logistics and Manufacturing “? Other authors classify the subject as applied to storage management operations. One can divide the activity, a priori, and in a simplified manner, into three subgroups: (a) receipt, (b) storage and (c) expedition, which will be detailed below.

Receipt

The group (a) consists of the tax receipt and then the physical, when respected academically. In practice, the two activities occur simultaneously. This step in the manufacturing flow is essential because it is the gateway to A moving inventories. Should be carried out with absolute accuracy, to avoid future problems of inventory control, fiscal analysis and even inventory. The supervisory process is to analyze the invoice received from the vendor and compare the same with the internal purchase order issued by the acquiring company. In this case, several questions must be raised: who is responsible for the tax receipt? What documents used for tax conference? And if there are differences in the tax process, what actions should be taken? Any tax process is the responsibility of the tax area, can be represented in corporate organizational charts for areas of finance, accounting, purchasing and even commercial. That is, the act of giving the invoice with the purchase order is the responsibility of these areas. Stop and imagine a stockist (other synonyms are warehouseman and ” plate “) with their working conditions and wages moving a document of great importance for organizations, as an order of blind conference. What are the responsibilities and consequences? The function stockist should be clear: the physical movement of material resources. Financial issues are not your responsibility ! In the event of discrepancies between the invoice from the supplier with the purchase order must be issued mandatorily a tax return note. It is a safe procedure, to avoid tax problems of movement and even the future inventory. However, the issue of this document can be performed in two ways: invoice partial or total refund. There are cases where the invoice sent by the supplier itself can be returned, provided that the goods have not been entered in the storage industry with the availability of the original freight, however, to perform on the document itself the justification and stamp cleaners. The invoice total return refers to the issue of this document by the receiving company materials, in whole returning items received at the warehouse, subject to various discrepancies in the drive. The invoice partial refund consisting of return of the goods to suppliers, since another portion was accepted. For any movement of incoming and outgoing material resources in the warehouse, the invoice is a binding instrument. The next step is the physical receipt, divided into quantitative and qualitative. Must first be verified the amount corresponding to the record contained in the invoice and purchase order items received. This analysis should be performed by a blind conference order, the document containing the completed “description ” fields and ” amount” blank to fill, to contrast the tax receipt. Depending on the volume of receipt, it will be done per sample, relying on statistical and good relationship with suppliers. Then, quality testing, will be made for subsequent storage. Sample tests are of utmost importance. Large companies should use this simple modeling of lots received as collateral. In this case, the basic statistical is an example. Adopt criteria such as population, sample standard deviation and variance, is essential. However, one should not forget to register these statistical tests, such as time series, control and follow up with suppliers and internal control. To each and every vendor, additionally reliability testing, good supply contracts and warranties of sending goods must be executed as security for storage, if applicable to the production or shipment.

Storage

The activity is related to storage, at first, to guard material resources. However, this operational role has direct relationship with the movement of funds for streets, storage structures, their levels, “boxes ” and drive itself. It is important to clarify that the areas of shipping and receiving of goods serve as conference. The ” lung” in manufacturing management is the storage area, where stocks are on guard. Starts work in the storage industry, with horizontal and vertical movement of goods for storage structures, eg, pallet, cantilever, dynamic, push-back, among others, which exist in the market, business experts to management of these business demands. The study of the adoption of storage structures should be correlated with the type of material stocked feature, for example, if they are perishable or periculosos, as well as items for internal handling (pallet jacks, forklifts, crane, etc.). For calculations of the internal volume, the technical quality standards applied by institutions such as ABNT (Brazilian Technical Standards Association) and ISO (International Organizational Standard) must be respected. The material handling can be done manually with the use of ” bins ” and due to the low volume of the products, or by forklifts and / or cranes with varied capacity is measured per tonne. The storage activity is related to the resupply of inventories, which companies must use proper techniques of materials management through management by category, to accurately calculate stock levels (maximum, medium and minimum) amount to buy, virtual inventory, orders, economic batch purchase and avoiding the breaking point. When dealing on materials management, the first step is to conduct studies on demand forecasting and capacity. For any deposit, there is a need clearance area for adaptation to future storage needs. To forecast refers to the registration and control of an historical reliable database, working with linear, non- linear and logistic curves in the prediction of future behavior models. These studies, to become reliable and applicable, must be correlated with a good level of understanding of the concepts of the graph ” Sawtooth ” and ” Bullwhip Effect “. Conceptually, the ” Sawtooth ” model determines the behavior of inventories according to the variables ” amount” versus ” time “, which it controls today and predicts the future. Analyzes the points of maximum virtual storage, average, minimum, and rupture, as the previous citation. The problem is not centered on the use of mathematical models and even computer programs for these resources. Many managers still use intuition when purchasing and inventory management, with serious impacts on industrial organization. A second point is the need to clarify the use of bar codes to facilitate and expedite the movement of funds. Exist in industry practice, the codes for European classification, known as EAN (European Article Numbering), with segmentations classification per unit item bale and pallet. The rates of reduction of losses and failures with using this method reach 30%. This type of classification evolves with the use of radio frequency technology, with gains in reliability. Within the same process, companies perform the selection of the request, according to the purchase intention of consumers. In a supply chain, ” final consumer ” can be interpreted as a wholesale / retail customers or even the final process in the distribution of goods. The selection of the request is to verify the existence and material resources of the defendants further confirmation for sale. This being done, there is the need for separation of resources, the storage area for shipping. This activity is known as separation or picking, of which, 60% of storage costs are spent in the activity due to the need for conference and accuracy for shipment, avoiding operational failures. It is noted that, in logistics, 62% of the costs are allocated to the transport sector, 20% to 18% for storage and others. Ie 60% of storage costs are intended for picking ! The separation is very important to dispose of material resources in accordance with clients’ requests. This activity should be carried out with maximum efficiency and adoption of control instruments such as packing lists separation. At this stage of warehouse management, this document is used in the field “description “, “quantity” and ” value “

the latter being unfilled. The goal is to hinder possible deviations and theft charges. The last step consists in the storage area of the packaging material resources to facilitate volume movement, rather than the fractionated material handling. Stimulates the reduction of the time of operations, costs and economies of scale. This final process is known as packing. To run the packing requires the use of instruments such as handling pallets and stretch films in order to wrap the resources. It is observed that the pallets must comply with the national standard PBR (Standard Brazil), in accordance with its scales (1.00 x 1.20), maximum capacity of 1500 kg and environment legislation in its manufacture, when wood.

Expedition

The last step consists in the expedition. Procedures for physical verification should be performed immediately after the separation (or picking, as previously mentioned), avoiding the transmission of damaged materials and reducing the costs of reverse logistics and ultimately the tax process with the issuance of the invoice and shipment of goods for consumers. The issuance of the invoice depending on the purchase order sent by the final consumer, even before picking and packing is a common mistake in logistics organizations. The invoice shall be issued only with the verification and existence of materials in stock and subsequent physical conference volumes. Thus, the logistics organizations can protect themselves from failures in delivery and reverse logistics. In this case, being an excessive and unnecessary cost. Finally, the goods must be sent and made ​​available on the shipping docks and stay in the selected mode of transport for sending and tracking of cargo to final consumers.

contemporary aspects

Currently, warehouse management, demand numerous academic studies and firms to the domestic and proper handling of inventories. There is a need for trained people to avoid operating losses and expedite delivery of products while respecting the level of logistics services (quality, time and cost). With the advent of technology systems, the entire warehouse can be managed through performance indicators and computer programs for high performance. For example, software such as WMS (Warehouse Management Sistems), RFID (Radio Frequency Identification Data) and even the encoding process (EAN code) can be cited. In particular, the WMS is a system that includes electronic form throughout the movement and clearance of cargo from the receipt, storage and subsequent shipment. Its use implies automation processes and reducing the number of people in work and, as a consequence, the total storage cost. There are several specialist companies on the market in the subject considering the use of these systems as a strategic differentiator for logistics organizations. Nevertheless, companies should worry about not creating bottlenecks in their deposits, scheduling even the shipping and receiving docks, with carriers and suppliers delivering on time, on the basis of demand forecasts. Respect the principle of collaborative management, proposed by several authors from Brazil and the world. Manage warehouses efficient way collaborates with the flow distribution across the supply chain. Importantly, the warehouses are efficient structures to reduce transport costs, respecting the concept of clusters, ie, integration with suppliers and consumers in the process of delivery. In contrast there is a tendency of increased storage costs and that it must be managed according to the explanation above.

Source: World Logistics Magazine

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