Pack & Ship

Pack & Ship will improve your warehouse processes – Introducing the concept of license plates

With the Pack & Ship module in Mobile WMS, we introduce the concept of license plates in the Pick, Pack, and Ship work processes. The license plate is a very flexible concept that allows your warehouse worker to associate a group of items with a unique number. In the real world, the license plate is typically a box or a pallet with a barcode label that contains the unique id.

The license plate is created in the picking process, where your warehouse picker will put every picked item into a license plate. Your warehouse worker will register where the license plates are stored in the shipping area at the end of the picking process, making it easy for another person to take over and complete the shipping process later.

Build Multi-Level License Plates to Document How Orders Are Packaged

A license plate is used to model a “container of items.” It can be a box, a pallet, a cage, a wagon, etc., with a unique barcode where items can be placed during the picking process. License plates are simply used to model how items are packed and are a building block in the shipping process.

The license plate labels can either be:

• Pre-printed unique labels: This saves the picker from printing labels before each pick. The picker can just grab some of the pre-printed labels and get started.
• Re-usable containers with unique license plate IDs: These can be specialized plastic boxes that fit on the picking wagon. These license plates are never shipped. The license plates are emptied into the container used for shipping in the shipping process. It can also be a pick wagon with a unique barcode or just a plastic card carried by the picker. Re-usable license plates must be emptied before they can be used again.
• Labels printed from within the picking process on the mobile device: These labels can include customer information that can help identify orders in the shipping area without scanning the license plate to see what it relates to.

The Ideal Warehouse Picking, Packing, and Shipping Process

The Pack & Ship process starts by simply scanning a license plate, whereafter the system automatically finds the related order and any other license plates included in the same order.

In the optimal scenario, the picked items are put in license plates to be shipped directly to the customer. An excellent example of this is a cardboard box in the right size for the order. This is typically only possible for small orders.

The Pack & Ship module allows the warehouse worker to re-arrange the picked items for larger orders. Multiple time-saving options can perform the most common packaging operations.

• Creating a new license plate and adding all picked license plates
• Moving one license plate to another license plate
• Moving items between license plates
• Emptying the content of all picked license plates into a new license plate

Introducing the warehouse packing station

The “Pack & Ship” module introduces the concept of a packing station. The packing station represents an area in the shipping zone where the picked items are prepared for shipping. When a pick is completed on the mobile device, the user is asked to register at which packing station the outbound license plates are stored. This can help locate license plates if they are not shipped right away. The packing station will typically have a printer where the shipping labels are printed.

Warehouse Shipment

The “Warehouse Shipment” document in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central is used to model a collection of items that need to be shipped to the same address with the same shipping agent and service.

The “Warehouse Shipment” can include source documents for different customers or addresses. This should be avoided to keep the simple relationship between what happens in the physical world and what happens in Business Central. If you have ten sales orders for ten different customers, you will have ten warehouse shipments. The warehouse shipment header is extended with a packing station to indicate where the order should be packed.

Warehouse Picking Optimisation

The “Warehouse Pick” document in Business Central is typically used to bring items for a particular “Warehouse Shipment” to the shipping area, but other scenarios are also supported. The “Pick Worksheet“ can be used to create:

• One “Warehouse Pick” that fulfills many “Warehouse Shipments”. E.g., many small sales orders. Each order will get its own outbound license plate. The mobile device makes sure that items for different orders are not put in the same outbound license plate.
• Multiple “Warehouse Picks” for one large “Warehouse Shipment,” E.g., creating different “Warehouse Picks” for different zones in the warehouse. Each pick will make one or more outbound license plates. The “pack & ship” process will show all license plates for a shipment. It does not matter that they were picked on different “Warehouse Picks.”

New options of printing in Mobile WMS Pack & Ship

The “Pack & Ship” module comes with two new print options. Both require that the customer has purchased the “Cloud Print” solution from Tasklet Factory:

• License Plate Labels: The license plate is a crucial building block in the solution. Your picker can print these from inside the pick order on the mobile device if no other license plates are available. The labels come in two variations: one with customer details and one without.
• License Plate Content Labels: Your warehouse worker can choose to print license plate content labels in the packing process. The complete content is printed if a license plate contains other license plates.

Integration Options for the Pack & Ship Module With 3rd Party Extensions

The Pack & Ship module in Mobile WMS has been integrated into the following 3rd party extensions from AppSource:

• ShipIT 365 from idyn
• LogTrade Connect from LogTrade

If one of these add-ons are installed, the Pack & Ship module can automatically transfer data about how the order is packaged to the shipping solution, and shipping labels are automatically printed. Everything happens on a mobile device, so a regular computer is unnecessary in this process.

The integration to the mentioned 3rd party extensions is included for free1 in the Mobile WMS solution.

Learn More About Pack & Ship