Create / Manage Order Source Reservations

An Order Source Reservation allocates a specified quantity of a product to a particular retailer. Order Source Reservations help you ensure the availability of inventory for specific retailers, while at the same time, help you avoid depleting your entire inventory (or significant amount of inventory), to one retailer.       

 

How Order Source Reservations Work: 

During fulfillment of an order, Infoplus checks for reservations of the ordered items from the Order Source (i.e., Amazon, Wal-Mart). 

• If a reservation is found and the order is for less than or equal to the quantity reserved, the order will fulfill.  
• If a reservation is found and the order is for more than the quantity reserved, only the reserved quantity will fulfill. The remaining quantity will either be back-ordered, if you allow back ordering, or will simply not fulfill. 
• Order Source Reservations can be applied across all warehouses or scoped to a single warehouse. An all-warehouses reservation holds the specified quantity for the order source regardless of which warehouse fulfills the order. A warehouse-specific reservation holds quantity for the order source only at the warehouse you select, so inventory at your other warehouses remains fully available to other order sources.

An Example in Action:

• You have a total inventory of 1000 aprons.
• You reserve 500 aprons for Bob's BBQ. 
• An order comes in from Bob's BBQ for 600 aprons. 
• Only 500 aprons in that order will be fulfilled for Bob's BBQ. The remaining 100 will either be backordered, if you allow back ordering, or will not fulfill. 
• If the order is from an Order Source that has not reserved any of the items, only the amount that is available after subtracting reservations, if any, will be fulfilled. If an order is placed for more product than is available (due to a reservation), that portion of the order will either be backordered, if you allow back ordering, or will not fulfill. The system will tag that quantity of the order with "ipsys-dnf-rr." (This tag indicates that the order "did not fulfill" due to a "retail reservation.") If you use Order Source Reservations, we recommend creating a filter action to be alerted when an order is tagged with "ipsys-dnf-rr". 

An Example in Action:

• You have a total inventory of 1000 aprons.
• The only reservation on this item is 500 aprons for Joe's BBQ. 
• An order comes in from Tony's BBQ for 600 aprons. 
• Only 500 aprons in that order will be fulfilled for Tony's BBQ (because the other 500 are reserved for Joe's BBQ). 
• The quantity of 100 that was unable to be fulfilled for Tony's BBQ will now be tagged by the system with the "ipsys-dnf-rr" tag and an alert will appear on the InfoPlus Dashboard. 
• If an adjustment to the inventory of an item occurs that impacts an Order Source Reservation (i.e., freezing or damaged stock), an Alert will appear on your InfoPlus Dashboard indicating how the reservation was adjusted due to limited quantity. For example, the alert might indicate "Reservation of ML7 adjusted from 1000 to 500 for BJ's BBQ as a result of frozen inventory.

Create an Order Source Reservation

To reserve quantity, the Order Source (i.e., BJ's BBQ) must already be created. See Create an Order Source for more information. 

1. Go to the Order Source Reservation table.
2. Click the Create New button. The Create New Order Source Reservation window appears.
3. Select the SKU for the item you want to reserve.
4. Select the Order Source for which you want to reserve the product. The amount of inventory available will display in the Unreserved Quantity field. You cannot create a reservation for more inventory than you have in stock in the system. To reserve quantity against non-specified sources, select Not Specified as the Order Source.
5. Select the Warehouse scope for the reservation. Choose All Warehouses to reserve the quantity across every warehouse, or select a specific warehouse to reserve the quantity at that location only. Keep in mind that a warehouse-specific reservation only applies to inventory at the selected warehouse. Inventory at your other warehouses will not be held for this order source.
6. Enter the amount to reserve into the Reserved Quantity field.
7. Click Save. The quantity will be reserved for the selected order source.

Edit an Order Source Reservation

1. Go to the Order Source Reservation table.
2. Click on the Order Source Reservation you want to edit to open it.
3. Click the Edit button in the bottom right.
4. Make the necessary edits and click Save.

Delete an Order Source Reservation

1. Go to the Order Source Reservation table.
2. Hover your mouse on the Order Source Reservation you want to delete and click the double arrows at the end of the record. 
3. Click Delete.
4. Click OK to confirm deletion. The Order Source Reservation will be deleted.

Check the Status of Orders, Items and Order Source Reservations:

We suggest the following steps to review records impacted by Order Fulfillment and Order Source Reservations.

Step 1 - Review the Shipped Quantity data for each item in an Order:

After an Order has been processed, access the Order record and review the line item's Shipped Quantity to determine how much of the ordered item was shipped.

Step 2 - Review the Order Source Reservation tab in an Item record:

After an Order is processed, access the Item record and click the Order Source Reservation tab to review the status of any reservations of the item.

Step 3 - Review the Audit trail of an Order Source Reservation.

The Audit trail on an Order Source Reservation will indicate how the reserved quantity was impacted by an Order. To see the Audit, go to the Order Source Reservation table. Then hover your mouse on the record and click the double arrows   at the end of the record and select Audit.

Order Source Reservation Tab on Item Record

You can manage Order Source Reservations directly from a tab within any item (use + More Tabs if the Order Source Reservation tab is not visible). This tab allows you to add or remove quantity in the Reservation field for any order source. Changes made here automatically update the Order Source Reservation table. Return to the Order Reservation Table for full editing capabilities.

Why an Order Source Can Show a Negative Orderable Quantity

InfoPlus lets you reserve inventory for specific order sources, such as your Shopify store, Amazon, or a wholesale channel. You may notice that an order source shows a negative Orderable quantity even though you have enough of the item in stock overall. This is expected behavior.

Two rules control how reservations work: 

1. The total reserved across all order sources cannot exceed the item's available quantity.
2. A single order source can be reserved for more than its current demand.

Because of rule 2, one order source can hold more inventory than it currently needs. That reservation reduces what is available to other order sources, which can push the Orderable quantity into a negative number.

Example: 

You have 100 units in stock. You reserve 90 units for your Shopify store, but Shopify only has 40 units of real demand right now. That leaves 10 units available for all other order sources. If another source has 15 orders, it will show an Orderable quantity of -5, even though your total stock (100) covers your total real demand (55).

What to do:

A negative Orderable quantity is a signal to review your reservations, not a sign of a stock problem. If you see a number you did not expect, check whether an order source is reserved higher than it needs to be and adjust the quantity to free up inventory for other sources.