Inner Packs and UOM in Infoplus

Learn how Inner Packs and UOM (units of measurement) work in Infoplus through a real-world example.

How do inner packs work? This is a question that often comes up with Infoplus users. To better explain what an Inner Pack is and how they work, here is one of our favorite real-world examples: tennis balls.

Let’s assume we have a full pallet of tennis balls. This is how it breaks down:

1 pallet has 12 cases of tennis balls, each case of tennis balls has 18 cans, and each can has 3 tennis balls in it. 

First, here are the UOM (units of measurement) that Infoplus uses: 

• Each
• Inner Pack
• Case 
• Pallet

Put another way, in Infoplus an Each is always ‘1’, but the rest of the UOM’s can be defined at the item level. 

In addition, you could define it at the time of receipt for items that are not standardized. 

Assume the following is set on an item: 

• Inner Pack: 5 - there are 5 balls to a can
• Case: 100 - there are 20 cans of 5 in a single case/box
• Pallet: 500 - there are 5 cases of 100 on a pallet 

Because Infoplus knows the above at the time of receipt, the second you receive something in, such as a pallet, Infoplus knows that 1 pallet = 500 eaches. 

In turn, you will also know that each case contains 100 eaches, therefore we know there are 5 cases total (not to be confused with quantity PER case, which is 100). Because we know the inner pack is 5, we know that 100/5 = 20 inner packs.

If you do not specify a UOM, Infoplus will go by eaches.

FAQs About UOMs in Infoplus

Why do you have 1 as an “each” if we would never receive or pick/pack/ship an order with only 1 tennis ball?

• It's important to understand that Infoplus inherently tracks everything by the each no matter what. Even if our users receive by the case or the pallet, behind the scenes Infoplus tracks how many eaches make that up and therefore always knows how many total units, inner packs, cases, pallets are on hand as long as they set up their items correctly in Infoplus.
• Example of UOM item set up below:  
• 
• When picking, the system is smart enough to break up the pick list by the ‘unit description’ of each item, these unit descriptions are nothing more than verbiage that shows up on the pick list. ie: if the customer ordered 555 tennis balls, the system would tell them to pick 1 pallet, 2 inner packs and 5 eaches
• An each can only be a single unit, each unit essentially

When the UOM is set to the lowest unit that can be picked, this would be the inner pack, right?

• It depends! Some Infoplus users don’t track quantity per case, so they somewhat cheat and say each case is an ‘each’. Each is always the lowest unit that can be picked and will always work that way. The other UOMs only work correctly if the item is set up correctly and/or they receive the items with the correct information.
  • Set up the item’s UOM correctly on the Item Details page in Infoplus
    

How does UOM work with picking and packing if Infoplus does not support Inner and Pallet but the UOMs are available to be input based on the Pick Scan Scheme?

• Yes, the case/pallet barcode fields we have will do nothing more than recognize the customer is working with a particular UOM. 

Does Each always equal one?

• The each is not necessarily one. In the tennis ball example, if the client is never going to ship single tennis balls, rather only the can of 5, that would probably be the each and all the quantities for that scenario should be the can counts (not the ball counts)
• In this case with the tennis balls, the inner pack would be blank because the Each would be the can of tennis balls. 
• You always want to set your lowest unit of measure as the ‘EACH’. So if you never break open cases, the case would be the each, if you never break down pallets, the pallets could be an each
• However, this scenario can happen as well where in the tennis ball example the unitsPerWrap is 5, and all the quantities are the number of balls, not the cans but this more often seen in older clients then newer clients.