All excellent points, Tracy.
Yes, the orders are printed and the order number has a barcode for them
to scan. Scanning that order number opens the order on the screen, and
all they have to do next is scan the box barcodes to record the units
being taken out (delivered.)
I tried having the app play car crash sounds when they scanned something
wrong (hand-keyed an unknown SKU #.) They turned the sound down. And, I
have to admit that with 7 truck bays, each with its own computer and
barcode scanner, the sounds start to become somewhat unhelpful (all of
this is in a large open warehouse environment.) Plus, there are
propane-powered forklifts zooming by constantly (my how they love to
race around on forklifts!) Electric would be quieter, but they're more
expensive.
Final point, and this is a point of much contention...
The app can, and used to, compare what they scanned and ensured that
they were scanning a SKU that was on the order. When the app did this,
it created WW3 with one side of the battle being the warehouse staff and
the other side being sales. (And in a sales environment, sales is king.)
The sales staff insists that they be able to call the warehouse and
make, literally, last minute changes to orders. Or, they just open the
order and change it (yes, the order that was printed out to paper, see
above.) The biggest offender in this way is one of the owners. He calls
the warehouse tells them to take X instead of Y for order 123 and the
warehouse can either open the order and edit it and reprint it and then
process it, or...yep, they must have the ability to scan out a SKU that
is not on that order. (we'll fix it in editing later!)
So, at this point, my battle is with the determination of whether input
is coming from a barcode scan gun (which I trust 99.856% of the time) or
a human on a keyboard. Once I've conquered this beast, it's on to the
next one.
Thanks to everyone for your input! Much appreciated even if it seems I
have a rebuttal for every challenge. You're showing me that the thought
processes I've gone through over the last decade were on track.
Mike
Tracy Pearson wrote:
Do they have a pick sheet they use to pull the orders?
If you have a barcode on it that is specific to the order and item, and a
barcode on the item. They would change the workflow to scan the barcode on
the pick sheet, then scan the matching item.
Your application will be able to match the order and following item. If they
don't match, you'll need to play sounds for them to hear it is a bad
match/scan.
Tracy Pearson
PowerChurch Software
[excessive quoting removed by server]
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