This article discusses how to quickly set up your Client Partners, including adding a new client partner, completing the partner details, adding products and setting up origins and consignee addresses.
A partner refers to the business or clients that you work with:
- Client Partners: Partners that you move and store goods for.
- Carrier Partners: Partners who carry goods to and from their destinations.
Creating a Client Partner
To access your partners you'll find Client Partners and Carrier Partner menu items in the menu. To create a new partner choose , then enter the name, code and other relevant information.
If you would like you can add a company logo at this step.
Once complete click Create Partner. You can now see details about this partner.
In the Custom Unit Types card you can add Unit Types that you expect to carry for this client.
By default Item Quantity, Weight KG, Volume M3 and Virtual Pallets are included and don't need to be added here.
The detail view of a new client partner
The detail tab has several cards we can edit, including Freight Settings, Financial Settings, and Storage Settings.
We can specify some details about Freight for this client partner by editing the Freight Settings card.
Under Freight Resolution we can determine how we want Consignly to proceed if more than one freight rates applies for a consignment for this client partner - Compounding, Least Expensive or Most Expensive.
A warning threshold can be set to alert should the freight margin or dollar value dip below a certain amount.
Under container threshold you can specify how many days a container can remain in store. Your dashboard will provide you with a list of all instore containers and how many days remain until you reach the detention period.
In the Products tab, you can set the rotation and depletion methods when this clients' products are picked.
Learn more about product rotation and depletion methods.
You can also set whether to display Batch, Expiry or Attributes on this partner's products, as well as setting defaults for whether batch and expiry dates are required for the product.
Adding Products
Client Partner Products are defined in the Products tab.
To add a product click Add Product. Enter the product code and name.
If the product is being stocked as a custom unit type you can select this here.
Next, identify the Product Group.
In some cases you may wish to assign different product to different groups. Activity rate charges can be set up to apply to different product groups, allowing you to charge different rates for different groups of product.
Volume and weight of the product need to be defined, as well as other optional fields such as SKU barcode for use in the warehouse app.
Finally, you can specify the number of products per pallet. This is for use when determining the number of virtual pallets in your warehouse and should be the number agreed upon between you and your client partner.
If your product uses serial numbers that you would like to be able to trace, select the Serial numbers supported checkbox. When you have added all of the required details, click Create Product.
You will now see the product has appeared in the product list for this client partner.
An example of the edit product screen in Consignly
To view the details for an existing product, simply click on it. You can download and print barcode labels for a product by clicking the Action Menu and selecting Download Barcode Label PDF.
There may be times that you need to remove or deactivate a product and you can also do this here:
- Remove Product: Removes the product completely.
- This option is only available if it has not been involved in any warehouse activity
- Deactivate Product: Makes the product inactive for now, but can be reactivated if needed.
You can search within your product list by typing in the search field. By default this list only shows active products but you can change the search filter status to Any or Inactive. To reactivate a product select the product and click on the Action Menu - select Activate Product.
Setting up Origin Addresses
Origins are locations that inwards consignments come from. Origins for each client partner are located in the 'Addresses' tab, in the Origins card.
Click Create Address. Add the name of the origin, now add the address, begin typing and options will be presented to you. You can also pinpoint a location on the map if it doesn't show in the results presented.
Finally, add a phone number for this origin. Once complete click Create Address.
To view or edit an origin, simply click on it. The Action Menu next to the Edit Address enables you to delete the origin if required.
Setting up Consignee Addresses
Consignees are the locations that outwards consignments will be delivered to. As with the Origin addresses add the name, address and phone number. Click Create Consignee to complete.
To view or edit an origin, simply click on it. The Action Menu next to the Consignee Details enable you to delete it if required.