Calculating Backorder Quantities Automatically
Order Entry can automatically calculate a backorder — the difference between the quantity ordered and the quantity shipped — when you enter an item on an order or invoice. The resulting figure is displayed in the Quantity Backordered field in the Order Entry, Shipment Entry, and Invoice Entry forms.
Any amount ordered but not shipped is considered to be a backorder, whether you have the stock ready to send, or are out of it and waiting for new stock to arrive.
If an order is entered with the Calculate Backorder Quantity option turned off, the backorder quantities will not be calculated on the order and will be zero if you don't manually enter them. Thus, when you click the Ship All button in Shipment Entry, you will get no result since the shipment quantity is determined based on the backorder quantity.
Selecting the option
To have the program automatically calculate and display the backorder quantity when you enter an item on an order, select the Calculate Backorder Quantities option on the Processing tab on the O/E Options form.
If you do not select this option, the program displays zeroes in the Quantity Backordered field, whether or not the quantity ordered is larger than the quantity shipped.
In either case, you can change the entry in the Backordered field. The option merely determines what appears initially in the field.
Reporting backordered quantities
The program reports backordered quantities on the Order List. You can see the value of orders which have not been filled on the Order Action and Aged Orders reports.
When you reduce amounts in the Backordered field without reducing the amount ordered, or cancel an order that has quantities entered in the Backordered field, the amounts are reported as lost sales on the Sales Statistics report when the entire order is complete.
If you are unable to ship all items on an order, but do not wish the unshipped quantities reported as lost sales, you can edit the item lines to reduce the quantities ordered to match the quantities shipped.