Accurate stock records help you reduce waste, improve cash flow, fulfil customer orders with confidence, and make better buying and production decisions.

Why accurate stock control matters

Inventory is one of the biggest working-capital investments in many businesses. When it is managed well, you know what you have, where it is, what has been ordered, what has been reserved, and when to replenish. That visibility helps prevent costly stockouts, avoids overbuying, reduces storage waste, and gives your team reliable information for purchasing, production, sales, and finance.

For printing and manufacturing businesses, accurate inventory is especially important because stock moves through several stages: raw materials are bought, issued to work orders, converted into finished goods, returned if unused, sold, and invoiced. BOS Professional is designed to support these steps so that the figures in your reports match what you can physically count in your warehouse.

How BOS Professional supports everyday inventory control

Because BOS Professional was built for the printing and manufacturing industries, it includes features that simplify and automate inventory-related processes. When the correct transaction sequence is followed, your inventory reports should reflect reality. For example, if BOS Professional shows 10 000 Matt White Paper, 200 gsm, 455x640mm in stock, you should be able to walk into the warehouse and count those items. Any difference between the system and the warehouse count should be investigated and corrected.

Everyday stock movements

Production-related stock movements

In addition to the illustrations above, you can use sales orders to reserve stock. Stock can be reserved for customers, and raw materials can be reserved for work orders. Reserving stock is the step before issuing it.

When these transactions are used consistently, BOS Professional can show what you bought, what you paid for it, what was used in production, what was returned, and what was sold. This creates a clear inventory trail from purchasing through production and sales.

Use BOS Professional reports to guide better stock decisions

Replenishment: buy at the right time

The replenishment report in BOS Professional helps you see what is available, what is already on order, and what has been reserved for sales orders. Purchase and work orders can be created directly from the replenishment report. By using this report, your business can move closer to receiving stock just in time instead of overbuying or running short.

Inventory ageing: identify slow-moving stock

The inventory ageing report helps you identify stock that has been sitting on your shelves for too long. You can use this information to decide whether to discount slow-moving items, check the condition of older stock, or write off stock where appropriate so that your records remain accurate.

Start with accurate stock on hand

All inventory features depend on accurate stock on hand. To check your current position, go to Inventory > Default. You can select today’s date or leave the date at its default No Date. The report shows:

• In stock: the quantity that should be physically on your premises.

• On order: quantities on active purchase orders.

• Reserved: quantities allocated to active sales orders.

• Available: the in-stock quantity less the reserved quantity.

If the report looks mostly accurate, you are ready to use the inventory features with confidence. If there are only a few red numbers, which indicate that stock was sold when the system did not show it as available, you can right-click the entry and click View Material Summary or View Detailed Inventory Register to see what went wrong: It might be a timing difference or a goods received transaction that is still in a pending status.

When your stock position needs a reset

If the report shows a sea of red numbers or a stock value that is unrealistic for your business, it may be better to reset your stock to zero and then capture a fresh stock take.

1. Navigate to Stock Check (Main Menu > Materials > Stock Check) and click New (button).

2. Set the filters you need. For smaller inventories, you can set category and location to all and select active items. For larger inventories, complete this exercise per category or per location.

3. Click View (button) to display the items.

4. Select the items you want to update (use Ctrl A to select all the items).

5. Click Create (button).

6. Filter to pending transactions and click Actions (button) > Set ‘Qty Count’ to 0 to reset the stock to zero.

7. Print stock count sheets from Output (button) > Print, count the stock physically, and capture the actual quantities in BOS Professional.

8. Once the quantities are captured, change the statuses to complete by clicking Actions (button) > Set Status to Complete.

Important: Run a full stock check before normal daily transactions begin, especially if you are resetting stock to zero. The stock check is done at yesterday’s date, so today’s transactions do not interfere with the count. For example, if you receive 100 widgets today and then count those same 100 widgets as stock on hand, you could accidentally double the quantity in the system.

Make BOS Professional your source of reliable stock information

Start by checking your Inventory > Default report today. If your figures are accurate, begin using the replenishment and inventory ageing features to make better purchasing and production decisions. 

If your figures need attention, investigate and fix small differences or run a stock check to reset and rebuild your inventory records. The more accurate your stock data is, the more value BOS Professional can deliver to your business.