Katana supports batch tracking to ensure full traceability of products and materials from purchasing through to sales. By assigning unique batch numbers (i.e. lot numbers) to purchased and manufactured items, businesses can track and manage the lifecycle of each batch, including expiry dates.
This gives you full traceability from purchasing to manufacturing to sales.
You can also assign expiry dates ("best before") to batches, giving you control over the shelf life of your items.
Note: Batch tracking is part of the Full Traceability add-on (automatically available in Professional plans).
Enabling item batch tracking
Batch tracking in Katana is an item-level setting. This means that it can be switched ON/OFF individually for each product and material on the item card. By default, batch tracking is switched OFF. Read more
Full traceability workflow
Katana's batch tracking functionality gives you full traceability for items from purchasing to manufacturing to sales, and back.
Items (materials or products) purchased with purchase orders are added to new or existing batches in stock. Read more
Ingredients used in manufacturing are selected from specific batches when completing manufacturing orders.
Products made with manufacturing orders are added to new or existing batches in stock. Read more
Products are selected from specific batches when selling the items. Read more
This gives you full traceability from the product on the sales order to manufacturing the product and the purchasing of ingredients used in manufacturing.
Useful information about batch tracking
If batch tracking is enabled for an item, you must select specific batches for each stock movement for the item (e.g. purchasing, making, selling, adjusting stock levels, transferring stock between Locations).
Each batch is associated with only a single item variant. Multiple items or variants cannot be included in the same batch.
Each batch number for the same item variant must be unique. You can use the same batch number for different item variants, but it will still be a different batch, just the batch number is equal to another batch.
All your batches are listed in the Stock screen > Batches tab. Read more
Batch tracking is enabled or disabled for the item at all Locations. Batch tracking is not a Location-specific setting.
Items from the same batch can be located at multiple Locations.
When searching batches, expired batches will only show after unexpired batches have already been shown
Batches can be assigned to stock movements when creating stock adjustments. Read more
Batches can be assigned to stock transfers when moving stock between Locations. Read more
How to find SOs connected to batches
If you need to see which sales orders are connected to a particular batch, head to the Stock screen and click on the item associated with the batch. This will bring up the Inventory intel window for this item which includes all relevant orders. Click in the Batch # dropdown to filter by a particular batch.
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