AvSight Operations—Outbound Shipping Process

This article will cover the basics of processing outbound shipments in the AvSight system.

Prerequisites:
Creating Sales Orders
OR
Creating Repair Orders

After a Sales Order or Repair Order has been created and approved, a release is created to authorize the warehouse to pull and ship the item. Creating a release is covered in the articles Creating a Sales Order and Creating a Repair Order. The outbound shipping process is integrated with many of the other parts of AvSight and will require information from other areas already covered in earlier articles.  As with all of the AvSight screens this required information can be created while working within a related area. However, it is highly recommended that you complete all of the previous articles under Administration, Inventory Management and Contact Management first. Releases are generated for both Sales Orders and Repair Orders. The steps for processing a release from a sales order and a repair order are the same.

Processing a Sales Order Release

Releases are processed in the Operations Module of AvSight. To access the Operations Module click the Apps Launcher Menu in the upper right corner of the screen and select AvSight Operations from the App Launcher.

Notice that there are now a new set of choices available in the navigation menu.  Select Operations to display a list of available releases.  There are various tabs on the operations page that correspond to the statuses of a release.  By default the page will open in the Picking tab.  If the desired release isn’t visible, it may be in a different status, such as Order Hold.  Selecting a particular tab will display the open releases in that status.  New sales order releases will appear under the Order Hold tab, pending credit approval unless the account terms dictate otherwise. Open the release and select Release Credit to move it to the Picking Phase. 

Picking

Switch to the Picking tab and open the desired Release.  The picking tab will display all of the line items that have been released for processing.  To the right of each line, is the Tech Data button.  This will open a screen displaying any technical data related to the line item, such as repairs, expiration, cycle limit, etc. This information will come from the part details screen supplied when the part was entered into the system.  Clicking the “X” will return you to the picking screen. A menu appears beneath the line item details and offers the option to Cancel, Generate Documents and Pick.  Cancel will return you to the Operations screen. Generate Documents will allow you to print a pick list and Pick will mark the items as picked and move the release to the next queue, Outbound QC.

Outbound QC

Outbound QC provides very important information about the parts that are being shipped. To the right of each line item are options to view any existing documents that are attached to the inventory as well as another opportunity to view its technical data. Below the line items details is a menu with the option for generating documents like the material certifications. Multiple documents can be selected by shift-clicking or control-clicking. Selecting the ASA Certificate document will open the ASA Fields Overrides screen. See below section for instructions on the material certification.

ASA Certificate Overrides

Much of the information contained in this screen will be automatically pulled from the inventory record like Source, Trace, etc.  This screen provides the option of overriding the data. Most of the fields are self-explanatory, but the following fields are worth noting:
AutoSign Cert  An employee’s signature can be stored in the employee’s profile and used to sign the certificate.
Select a Remark  Up to 10 frequently used remarks can be stored in the Administration > Master Tables > Forms Options section. Other or additional comments may be added in field 13A Remarks.
Clicking next will create a PDF of the ASA Certificate and open it in a separate window. The cert can be downloaded or printed. Clicking Save Copy to Release will attach a copy to the release form for future reference.

Shipping
Shipping is the final phase of operations. Select the Shipping tab and open the desired release. The shipping tab has 5 editable fields:
Shipped Via  This is the actual shipping method used and may differ from the one specified on the original sales order.
Number of Pieces  The number of boxes that make up the shipment. This is helpful in tracking a missing or delayed shipment.
Freight Charge
Airway Bill Number
Total Weight

When finished, click Ship. 

CAUTION!  Up until this point, the order and release can easily be cancelled.  Once the ship button has been clicked, there are various factors that must be considered in order to be able to cancel a shipment.  Clicking ship automatically sets processes in motion in other areas like sending of an invoice to the customer.  Make sure that everything is accurate and complete before clicking ship.

Cancel Shipment Option

If a Release is shipped by mistake, there is an option to cancel the shipment. The feature is found in the Release screen within the Sales Order as a “Cancel Shipment” button. The most common reasons for canceling a shipment are the shipment needed to go out later or was not yet ready. The factors that must be considered before using the Cancel Shipment feature are around the Invoice and the Customer. If the customer has already received the invoice, you would not cancel the shipment and instead create an RMA for Credit. NOTE: there are validations in place that may prevent canceling a shipment based on the invoice status. Feel free to contact the AvSight Support department if you are sure about canceling the shipment but the validation is preventing you from proceeding.

Related Articles:

Working with Repair Orders
Working with Sales Orders