Distribution branches, pickup later, and to be delivered

Distribution branches, pickup later, and to be delivered

Overview

If your customer doesn't want to - or can't - take their items immediately there are a couple of options available: Pickup Later or To Be Delivered.

By default, the POS assumes all goods sold are 'Take Now' - this means that the goods will be removed from the inventory immediately. This is appropriate for most retail stores.

There are two other options that can be used, however: Pickup Later or To Be Delivered.

These are particularly useful when used in combination with Distribution Branches. For instance, if you sell furniture from a showroom, you can sell a sofa to a customer, then either allow the customer to pick it up from your warehouse or request the warehouse deliver it to the customer.

Distribution branches

If you have more than one branch, and you allow customers to pick up or receive deliveries then you could consider adding distribution branches to your POS.

To add a distribution branch:

  1. While logged in as an Administrator, select your username in the top right corner and then select Settings.

  2. From the POS Menu select POS Settings.

  3. At the bottom of the page, set Enable Selection Of Distribution Branch to Yes.

  4. From the checkboxes below, tick the branch or branches you would like available as distribution branches.

  5. Select Finish.

Remember to sync settings in the POS after making changes to the settings.
The distribution branches will now appear as options when either of the below are chosen.

Pickup later

'Pickup Later' should be chosen when the customer themselves will pick the goods up, either from the current branch or from another branch in the system.

  1. Add a product to a POS transaction.

  2. Select the Take Now Qty field.

  3. From the radio buttons to the left, select Pickup Later.

  4. If you have distribution branches set up, you will be asked to choose which branch the stock should be picked up from.

  5. You can set an estimated pickup date for the order.

You can now take payment for the order as usual. On the receipt that is printed, the goods to be picked up will be shown, along with the address of the branch that the stock should be picked up from.

Transactions that have a distribution branch will appear for both branches. Therefore the warehouse branch could filter their sales orders by branch and see those orders that are likely to be collected.

  • Selecting Pickup later will not remove the product from the stock available. This means that there is a possibility the products will be sold elsewhere. Therefore we do not recommend using this setting unless the goods will be picked up within a short period of time.

To be delivered

'To Be Delivered' should be chosen when you will deliver the goods to the customer.

When this option is chosen, we recommend that you add customer details to the order - so that you know the destination of the delivery.

In the showroom example given above, a sofa is sold at the showroom and will be delivered by the warehouse to the customer's address at a later date.

To set a product or products to To Be Delivered:

  1. Add a product to a POS transaction.

  2. Select the Take Now Qty field.

  3. From the radio buttons to the left, select To Be Delivered.

  4. If you have distribution branches set up, you will be asked to choose which branch the stock should be sent from.

  5. You can set an estimated delivery date for the order.

You can now take payment for the order as usual.

Transactions that have a distribution branch will appear for both branches. Therefore the warehouse branch could filter their sales orders by branch and see those orders they are due to deliver.

FAQs

Can these options be hidden?

Unfortunately, it is not possible to hide these options.

Is this a layby?

With Pickup Later or To Be Delivered, the customer has paid in full, owns the product, and is simply waiting to collect or receive an order. Laybys are slightly different. With a layby, the customer has only partly paid for the product and does not own the product yet. Unfortunately, it is not possible to hide these options.

I've made an order with a distribution branch, how do I now close the order?

After the distribution branch has dispatched the goods to the customer, you will need to find the order in the backend and enter a fully dispatched date. Stock will be taken from the distribution branch.

Was this article helpful?

Have more questions? Submit a request