Managing Freight & Shipping

There are several settings you can configure from Admin>General that will apply to your Sales Orders.

Invoice Settings

Shipping options in Admin>General>invoice Settings

Shipment Action

You can choose from the following actions when a shipment is generated from a Sales Order:

• Do Nothing – does exactly that; you will not be prevented or prompted.
• Prevent Shipment Creation – when you generate a shipment from a Sales Order that hasn’t been invoiced yet, a pop-up warning will display and warn you that an invoice needs to be created before a shipment can be generated. You will not be able to proceed with creating a shipment until the order has been invoiced.
• Show Warning – when you generate a shipment from a Sales Order that hasn’t been invoiced yet, a pop-up warning will display and you can choose to proceed with the shipment, or cancel to go back and invoice the order and then generate the shipment.
• Auto-Invoice Based on Shipped Quantity – when a shipment is generated from a Sales Order, an Invoice will automatically be created for the shipped quantity.

Send Shipment Confirmation

When a shipment is generated, a confirmation email will automatically be sent to the recipient. Once you have ticked this box, the Shipment Confirmation Email Template field will become visible and you can select an Email Template to use for this purpose.

Default Courier

If you have already set up Couriers in your system, you can choose a default service to apply to all new Sales Orders, which will then flow through to new shipments generated from orders.

Shipment Confirmation Email Template

The Send Shipment Confirmation box needs to be ticked for this field to appear – this is where you choose which Email Template to apply when a shipment confirmation is sent.

This setting assumes that you have previously set up an Email Template for this purpose – for help doing this, see our pages on Creating Email Templates and Using Email Templates.

Freight Product

This setting is further down on the Admin>General page in the Sales/Purchase Editor section.

You can use a system default freight option and quickly apply a freight cost to shipped orders that don’t require a unique Freight Quote – just select the Freight TE Freight TE option in this field.

When you create a new Quote or Sales Order, you can add the default freight product as an item and then add a price.

Freight Product setting in Admin>General>Sales/Purchase Settings

Adding the default freight option to a Quote

Auto-ship Stock When Available

If you check this box, manufactured Products that are out of stock when they are added to a Sales Order will be automatically have a shipment created as soon as stock becomes available.

Auto-Ship Stock setting in Admin>General>Manufacturing

The default templates that are used for a range of shipping activities are controlled from Admin>General>PDF And Email Templates.

At present, you cannot modify these templates, but can choose a different system template from the current default e.g. in the Delivery Docket PDF Template and Picking List PDF Template fields you can use either the Delivery Docket or Picking List template as the default option.

Various shipment templates in Admin>General>PDF & Email Templates

To enable management of your own deliveries in the Sales Order module, you will need to configure the following settings in the Delivery Options area of Admin>General.

These settings will apply when want to use your CRM to manage shipments you are using your own Resources for (e.g. cars/trucks/bikes etc.) and are not outsourcing the shipment to a freight company.

• Show Sales Orders on Calendar – ensure this box is ticked so that you can view deliveries in Calendar View within the Sales Order module.
• Show Delivery Time – ensure this box is ticked so that the time allocated to each delivery is shown as a calendar appointment.
• Default Delivery Duration – this field is in HH:MM format and allows you to select a period of time that will apply as default for each delivery. You can change the duration from the default option when you are working with Sales Orders.

Delivery Options in Admin>General

On Contact and Company records there is a text box called Delivery Instruction where you can enter in notes or instructions that will pull through to a Delivery Instruction box on all Quotes, Sales Orders and Invoices that you create for the customer.

In addition, when you generate shipments from a Sales Order, the details will also pull through to the Delivery Instruction box on Outbound Shipments.

Delivery Instruction box on a Company record

Delivery Instructions pulled through from the customer record to a Quote

Delivery Instructions pull through from sales records to Outbound Shipments

Depending on whether you are sending or receiving goods, you will be able to move shipments through various stages and generate applicable lists, labels and dockets as you go – these documents will all open as a PDF in a new window.

Following is a summary of the stages and available documents for different types of shipments.

Outbound shipments

You can mark these as Picked, Packed or Shipped and generate a Delivery Docket, Pick List or Stock Label, which will open as a PDF document in a new tab.

Outbound Shipment phases

Outbound Shipment documents

Stock Transfer Shipments

You can mark these as Picked, Packed or Shipped and generate a Stock Label, which will open as a PDF document in a new tab. When a new Stock Transfer Shipment is generated, it defaults to status To Be Picked.

Stock Transfer Shipment phases

Stock Transfer Shipment documents

Inbound shipments

When a new Inbound Shipment is generated, it defaults to status To Be Picked until you Mark As Received.

Marking an Inbound Shipment as received

You can add Resources and Resource Groups to your system to manage internal resources like cars, motorbikes and trucks and then add them to your Shipments.

The Delivery Resource field on a Shipment record

When you create a new Resource or Resource Group, you can tick the Add on Calendar box to make the information available to view in the Calendar module – the example below shows the Resource Group ‘Trucks’ and Resources ‘Melbourne Delivery Truck’ and ‘Sydney Delivery Truck’.

This feature allows you to visually track and adjust the scheduled use of your Resources.

Calendar showing the delivery truck Resources

Resource Groups

These are high-level groups that you can add any number of Resources to – just click on the New Group button. The example below shows ovens as a resource as they will be used to manufacture a range of Products, and a group for delivery trucks that will used to ship orders to customers – you can add any type of resource groups your business uses.

Resource Groups in Admin>Calendar>Resource Groups

Making a Resource Group visible on the Calendar

Resources

You can create any number of Resources and associate them with Resource Groups. Just click on the New Resource button to create a new Resource.

The example below shows a number of ovens that are all linked to the ‘Ovens’ Resource Group, and several different trucks that have been linked to the ‘Trucks’ Resource Group.

Resources in Admin>Calendar>All Resources

Making a Resource visible on the Calendar

You can add delivery couriers and carriers that you use to your system and then apply your choices to Sales Orders and Shipment records. You can also select a default courier to apply to all your Sales Orders from Admin>General>Invoice Settings.

To add a Courier, navigate to Admin>Couriers and click New Courier – you will be able to add the company name and a tracking URL (at present, the tracking URL doesn’t perform a function within CRM).

Couriers module in Admin

Courier selection and tracking fields on a Sales Order

Courier and tracking fields on a Shipment record