Understanding Classic Allocation

Strategies are used for classic allocation and pre-allocation to configure the system to perform allocation as needed to meet operational needs. Each strategy can contain a series of logical steps used to determine how the system should determine where each item should be picked from and which units of measure are to be picked. The pick code identified within each step contains specific criteria for that step. The pack configuration assigned to the product is also a critical component used when the system determines how to break down the pick information.

Multiple allocation strategies are available in the base application to provide various options for allocating inventory based on operational needs. These base strategies can be edited, or new strategies can be created to configure the application to produce the required results. The functionality within the strategies is flexible and should be able to be configured to meet a wide variety of operational usages.

In addition to how the strategies use various units of measure breaks and pick codes to determine how orders are allocated, there are other settings that control how allocation works. These settings include:

  • ALLOWOVERALLOCATION (System Setting) - used to control if more inventory can be allocated from forward pick locations (Pick-Piece or Pick-Case) than is available.
  • Retry if Quantity Remains (Classic Allocation Strategy) - If this is set to Yes the system tries to allocate using the next step of the strategy if the quantity expected on that step could not be fulfilled.
  • Consider Current Pick Location Inventory When Determining Lots for Pre-Allocation (Classic Pre-Allocation Strategy) - If this field is selected, the system allocates from a forward pick location based on which lots are currently in the location, not strictly allocating based on rotation (usually FIFO).

Provided below are examples of how the various strategies handle inventory situations to allocate outbound orders. These examples should provide a guideline you can use to understand which strategy you should use or how to create a new strategy based on the operation.

All of the scenarios covered in the following sections include the same pack configuration and order quantity.