Releasing backorders by posting product receipts

The primary method for releasing backorders is to post product receipts. If a product's quantity on hand is less than its reserved quantity (a product's total open order quantity) at the time the product's receipts are posted, iMIS checks for backorders and commits products to them.

If a product's inventory remains insufficient for filling all backorders after posting receipts, the receipts are applied to orders in priority order, such as the oldest orders receiving priority over the newest orders for the given priority. Priority 1 is the highest priority as defined in the Priority field on the Enter and edit orders window. Orders with no priority assigned (the Priority field is left blank) are the last orders filled and sort in date order, oldest to newest.

All orders with committed receipts print on the receipts posting report, indicating the quantity committed to them and the stage or status of the order when the receipts are posted.

If shipping papers have been printed for a partially shippable order, iMIS commits the appropriate quantity to the order. However, iMIS does not move the committed quantity from the Back field to the Ship field as displayed on the Enter and edit orders window.

Partially shippable orders for which shipping papers have been printed are handled differently than other partially shippable orders because the shipping personnel dictate the product quantity that actually ships. For example, the shipping personnel may decide to ship the actual quantities indicated, or they may decide to override the shipped quantities and ship a different amount.

In either case, iMIS must wait for specific shipping instructions for processing the order. The best alternative in this situation is to enter the revised shipped quantities when the shipment entry is recorded if a manual override is processed. If the quantities are not revised, iMIS generates a shippable order when the order is invoiced.

To release backorders after printing shipping papers

When the Automatic Backorder Processing option is enabled, backorders move to the appropriate order processing stage for the given order type when the backordered product's inventory transaction is posted. The only time this does not happen automatically is if the order has been converted through the Print shipping papers processing stage.

After you print the shipping papers for an order with backordered products, you must edit the shipped and backordered products on the Ship Order window. For example, if you place an order for 25 products but only 20 are in stock, and then you print the shipping papers for the order, you will need to edit the Ship and Back quantities on the Ship Order window at the Ship orders processing stage.

  1. From Orders, select Process orders > Print shipping papers to open the Print shipping papers window.
  2. Select the order with products on backorder.
  3. Click Convert, and move the order to the Ship orders processing stage.
  4. Enter and post a receipt for the backordered product (see Posting inventory transactions).
  5. Review the effect of the inventory receipt on the product's inventory (see Viewing product inventory).
  6. From Orders, select Process orders > Ship orders to open the Ship orders window.
  7. Double-click the order to open the Ship Order window.
  8. Edit the number of products that you are shipping in the Ship field.
  9. Press Tab to update the number of products on backorder as displayed in the Back field.
  10. Click OK.

To release backorders by editing open orders

If necessary, you can edit the ship quantities and, by default, backorder quantities of any open order before invoicing the order. For example, if you forgot to release an order's backorders before reaching the Invoice orders processing stage, you still can edit the ship quantities as long as you do not invoice the order.

  1. From Orders, select Enter and edit orders to open the Enter and edit orders window. The Overview tab displays by default.
  2. Open the order (see Finding orders) for which you want to release backordered products.
  3. Click Edit.
  4. Select the product you want to release from backorder from the Product List field.
  5. While pressing Shift, edit the quantity in the Ship field.
  6. Press Tab to update the quantity in the Back field.
  7. Click Save.

Note: Select a product line-item in the Product List field to display a product's available inventory at the bottom of the Overview tab. If you are using multiple warehouses, a product's total available inventory and warehouse inventory display.