We have a customer who we commit to keep on hand a manufactured product as a replacement if in case his unit fails. Therefore he has a problem, sends his unit in, we send one out straight away customer happy.
However, the unit he sent in, I would like to put back into stock (after repair and successful testing) but would like this unit to be specifically reserved for this customer until such time he has a another problem and we could send out this repaired unit.
And so the cycle would continue.
What is the best way to manage this? Once the unit has been repaired, how do I make it possible that only this specific unit can be allocated to this customer (and not run the risk this unit) would be sold to any one else?
I would consider giving this a unique part number. It really isnât the same as the original part since it is the customerâs and it has been repaired. That shouldnât be called the same part number as newly mfd original in my opinion. Perhaps use the original part number along with a customer identifier. You could also add a customer cross reference part number that ties this repaired part number, and original part sold part number to what the customer calls it.
We use a ârepair and upgradeâ placeholder part number to track our part repairs. It is lacking however in that the part number does not provide details on what the part originally was. This would not be good for inventory of repaired parts. However we also use serial tracking and so the repair comes back with same serial number as original sold part number.
I wonder if the new âtrack inventory by revisionâ functionality in the Kinetic 2022 Fall Release would be useful. Receive the RMAâd part, assign it a different revision thatâs not used for general sales, and use that for future repairs and re-orders.
We use segregated BINs set up as Non Nettable to keep track of stuff like this.
Preventing it from getting used for customers we do not want to use it for is basically handled by physical organization (donât pick from these BINs)
Using it for the specific customers we want to is done manually by a person. Having the stuff in BINs set up as non nettable makes it easy to put those BINs on a DB for a person to check when orders are getting filled. It is a lot of faff.
Define a new warehouse as a customer warehouse. When you add bins to it, you can set the customer who âownsâ the bin. That way you can see what and who the parts are for.