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How to Reserve Items That Have Sold to a Customer

The Item Reservation feature allows you to reserve Inventory Parts and Serialized items that are currently in your warehouse(s) and prevent them from being sold to another Customer:Job.  Once reserved, you can only place the reserved items on Sales and Invoices for the Customer:Job that they are reserved for.

New Account is Created in Chart of Accounts

Enabling the Item Reservation feature will create a new Chart of Account called Work in Progress.  This is a designated account in Total Office Manager that is used for the purpose of reporting the reserved costs on your financial reports.  You can change the default Number from WIP to a number that fits within your current numbering system.  You can also change the account name if desired.

New Forms and Columns

In addition to the new Work in Progress account, the Item Reservation feature also displays additional columns on various forms.  With the feature enabled, you will now see three different columns for quantities.  The Total Qty displays the entire count for the Invoice Item.  The Avail Qty displays the total quantity that is available for resale to your customers.  This count excludes items that you have reserved for customers.  The Rsvd Qty displays the total quantity that is on hold and not available for resale.

How to Access Item Reservations

  1. Enable the preference for Item Reservations by navigating to Edit | Preferences | Items | Company Preferences.
    • Please Note:  You must be logged in as the Administrator or have permission to enable Company Preferences.
  2. From the main menu, click Company | Inventory Adjustment | Item Reservation List

There are numerous forms that include an item reservation button. Here are some of them:

  1. Work Order
  2. Item Receipt
  3. Bill
  4. Credit Card Charges

Field & Button Definitions

The following fields are from the Inventory Adjustment form.

  1. Date – Enter the date that the reservation occurs.  This is also the date that the reservation will affect your financial reports.
  2. Customer:Job – Enter the Customer:Job that you are reserving the items for.
  3. Department – Select the department that the reservation is associated with. This is the department that will populate on the Invoice/Sale line-entry when the reserved item is placed on an invoice.
  4. Entry # – This is an auto-populated field that references the Item Reservation. You can change this number if desired.
  5. Default Warehouse – If selected, this is the Warehouse that will populate in the Warehouse field when a new item is selected in the grid.
  6. Memo – This is an internal memo field that you can make notes about the reservation.
  7. Item – Contains only Invoice Items that are of type Inventory Part or Serialized.  Select the items that you would like to reserve.
  8. Qty – Enter the total number of the item that you are reserving.
  9. Cost Ea. – The current Average Cost for the item selected.  If the item is a Serialized part, it will be the cost for the Serial Number selected.  This is the cost that will be preserved for the Customer:Job.
  10. Total Cost – Result of the Qty multiplied by the Cost Ea.
  11. Warehouse – Select the warehouse that you are reserving the items from.  You can only reserve from what is available in each warehouse.  If the part exists in another warehouse and you want to reserve in a different warehouse, you will need to do an Inventory Adjustment to move items between warehouses before reserving the item selection.  This field will auto-populate with the warehouse selected in the form header for all new items selected.
  12. Make Adj. – Opens the Adjust Serial Numbers form for Serialized line entries.  Opens the Add Inventory Adjustment form for Inventory Part line entries.  This option can be used to make warehouse transfers for a single part.  Once the transfers are made, the warehouse item quantities will automatically update.
  13. Save & Close – Saves the Item Reservation and closes the form.
  14. Save & New – Saves the Item Reservation and opens a new Item Reservation form.
  15. Batch Adjust Inventory Parts – Opens the Inventory Review/Adj form.   This option can be used to make warehouse transfers for all Inventory Parts that are selected on the Item Reservation.

Step-By-Step

The flow of Item Reservations is simple.  You must track inventory in order to use the Item Reservation feature.  You must have available quantities to reserve items for Customer:Jobs.

  1. Turn on the preference to begin using Item Reservations.
  2. Create an Item Reservation for your Customer:Job.
  3. Select the items that you want to reserve for the Customer:Job. Save & Close the reservation.
  4. When you are ready to invoice for the job, place the reserved items on the Sale/Invoice by going to Menu | Item Reservation.

Deleting Item Reservations

You may delete an Item Reservation from the Item Reservation list. To do this, right-click and select Delete.

This will reverse the accounting related entries, as if you never created a reservation. Please be sure that you properly invoice for the items you reserved (if needed).

Reports

Item Reservation by Customer:Job

The Item Reservation by Customer:Job displays the history of reserved items for any given customer.  This report can be accessed by going to Reports | Company | Items | Item Reservations | Item Reservations by Customer:Job.  This report displays the history of an Item Reservation and the total value of inventory that you have reserved for that Customer:Job.

Item Reservation by Item

The Item Reservation by Item displays the history of reserved items.  This report can be accessed by going to Reports | Company | Items | Item Reservations | Item Reservations By Item.  This report displays the history of an Item that has been placed on a reservation and the total value of inventory that has been reserved.

Transaction by Details by Account

The report is not exactly intended for the Item Reservation feature, but it is a great report when you wish to see the transactions for the Work in Progress account.

Debits and Credits

When an item is reserved, the Inventory account is credited (reduced) and the WIP account is credited (increased). When the item is sold, the WIP account is debited (decreased) and the COGS account is credited (increased).

Item Reservation Tips

  • You cannot reserve more than you have available in any given warehouse.
  • You can sell more than what is reserved for any given Customer:Job. The reserved quantities and direct cost will be used first.  The current average cost will be added to the entry for any quantity that exceeds the reserved quantity. Serialized items will use their exact cost.
  • You can turn off this feature in Preferences and/or inactivate the WIP account. If you do, any WIP balances that may exist will remain. If you decide to turn off this feature, you will need to “empty” the WIP account. Make sure it has a zero balance.
  • You can only reserve Inventory Parts and Serialized items. That’s because the other types are not actually considered physical items that you have in your possession.
  • If Items are used from the Item Reservation feature, you do not need to select them from the Reimbursables form.  If they exist in your Reimbursables list, you can hide them.

Related Content

Percentage of Completion AKA: Progress Invoice