EasyPost - Batch Shipment Processing
The Batch Shipping process is perfect when filling a large number of orders for the same product.
For example, AcctVantage ERP users that offer recurring sales or monthly ‘box clubs’ need to send out a large quantity of the same product in a short amount of time. Often this means repeatedly pulling a unit off the shelf, applying a shipping label and passing off to the carrier. The standard process of creating a pick ticket, generating a shipping label and updating the Order as shipped for each individual order is too time consuming for this scenario.
With batch shipping, the user can select any number of Sales Orders (all containing a single inventory line item), generate shipping labels and update the Orders’ status for the entire set at one time.
Before you can process batch shipments, there are two setup items to complete:
How to Process Batch Shipments
1. Sales Order eligibility
In order to process batch shipments, the following three conditions must all be True:
- Sales Orders selected for Batch Shipping must NOT be posted. However, the orders can be of any Order Status.
- Line items:
- There must be exactly one Inventory line item per Sales Order included in the batch.
- There can be any number of Non-inventory line items.
- Quantity:
- There must be exactly one unit of the inventory line item shipped.
- There can be any quantity of Non-inventory line items.
____________________________________________________________________
Orders will NOT be eligible for Batch Shipping if those 3 conditions are not met. There is also one additional condition that can help identify eligible orders, but it is not required ...
- If all three of the above conditions are true AND the Self-Ship Box setting has been checked on the Inventory Product record, the Sales Order will automatically be tagged as a Self-Ship Order. This is an ease-of-use feature. It is not required to process batch shipments, but it will help you find orders that are eligible.
2. Select the Orders to process Batch Shipments for
The simplest way to find the Sales Orders is to use the Filter By menu to select one of the 'Self-Ship Orders' filters and then click Find. This will bring up all orders that are eligible to be shipped in their own box.
If you're processing Batch Shipments for a Product that DOES NOT use a Self-Ship Box, the filters below will not work. In that scenario, you would need to find the Orders using a different search criteria (such as cross-referencing to the Product window.)
- Self-Ship Orders: This will find ALL orders that have the Self-Ship Order box checked.
- Self-Ship Orders, No Shipments: This will find orders that have the Self-Ship Order box checked but no shipments have been processed. Use this filter to find orders that are eligible for batch shipping.
- Self-Ship Orders, w/ Shipments: This will find orders that have the Self-Ship Order box checked, with a shipment that has already been processed.
Once you have a list of Orders to process, highlight the orders and then select the Action Menu > Batch Shipping. This will bring up the Batch Shipments window.
3. Batch Shipments window
By default, the Batch Shipments window will look similar to the example below. The first screenshot below is how the window should look before any options are checked.
-
Get Parcel Dimensions from Product: Check this box to tell the system to use the dimensions that were entered on the Product record.
- Self-Ship Orders Only: Check this box to narrow the selection to only include Sales Orders with the Self-Ship Order setting checked. This setting can only be used in conjunction with the setting above.
----------------------- OR -----------------------
- Length, Width, Height, Weight: If you choose not to enable the Get Parcel Dimensions from Product setting, you will need to manually enter the dimensions here. Every package in the batch will be assigned these dimensions.
____________________________________________________________________
- Label and Printer Setup: Select the Label Name(s) and Printer(s).
- Set Shipped Orders to 'Inv/Shipped' Status: Check this box for the system to automatically change the Order Status to Shipped/Invoice (i.e. Ready to Post) after the labels are printed.
4. Batch Shipment details
After you check the options that you want to apply to the Batch Shipment, the screen will look slightly different. Referencing the list of settings above, here are the notable changes:
-
Get Parcel Dimensions from Product: Since this box has been checked, there is now a Part Number column visible in the detail area. This is the Product where the dimensions are being pulled from.
- Order #50: This order highlighted in red does not have box dimensions entered on the Product record so it will not be processed.
-
Self-Ship Orders Only: Since this box is checked, the system will only process shipments for orders that are marked as self-ship.
- Order #49: This order highlighted in red is not a self-ship order so it will not be processed. If we were to uncheck the Self-Ship Orders Only setting, this order would be eligible to be processed in the batch.
- Orders #46, #47, #48: These orders highlighted in green are self-ship orders so now they're "Ready to ship."
- I have also selected the Label and Printer settings and I've enabled the setting to set the orders to Shipped/Invoice status.
Other notes:
- Selected Orders: Five orders were selected to be included in this batch of shipments.
- Problem Orders: Two of the orders were "problem" orders that won't be processed in the batch.
- Ready to Ship: There are three remaining orders that are now ready to be processed.
5. Start Batch Shipments
When you're ready to begin processing shipments, click the Start Batch Shipments button.
- The labels will be printed in the same sequence that they're displayed in the window.
- If the Set Shipped Orders to 'Inv/Shipped' Status option was selected, the orders will be moved to Shipped/Invoice status automatically.
- After the shipments are processed, you can save the Export Status Log or click Done to leave the window.