Oracle Physical Inventory

Oracle Inventory provides a fully automated physical inventory feature that you can use to reconcile system–maintained item on–hand balances with actual counts of inventory. Accurate system on–hand quantities are essential for managing supply and demand, maintaining high service levels, and planning production.
1. Define a physical inventory for your whole warehouse or subdivisions within your warehouse.
2. Take a snapshot of system on–hand quantities. You must procedurally coordinate the snapshot of your physical inventory with your actual counting, and ensure that no transaction activity occurs in a particular location until after you have performed your adjustments.
3.1 Generate alphanumeric tags.
3.2 Count the TAGs. Void unused or lost tags.
3.3 Approve or reject physical inventory adjustments based on approval tolerances.
4. Automatically post adjustments to inventory balances and general ledger accounts.
5. Purge physical inventory information.

Defining a Physical Inventory

You can define and maintain an unlimited number of physical inventories in Oracle Inventory. A physical inventory is identified by a unique name you assign. You use this name to identify any activity, such as adjustments, pertaining to this physical inventory.
You can define multiple physical inventories to count selected portions of your inventory, or you can count your total inventory. For example, if your warehouse has two large stockrooms, each represented by a subinventory, you can define two physical inventories, one for each subinventory. You can then perform your physical inventory of the first stockroom, independent of the second.
To define a physical inventory:
Navigate to the Physical Inventories Summary folder window and choose New. The Define Physical Inventory window appears.

1. Enter a unique physical inventory name.

2. Select approval requirements for adjustments.
Always: Require approval of all physical inventory adjustments.
If out of tolerance: Hold for approval those counts that are outside the limits of the positive and negative quantity variance or value tolerances.
Never: Allow any adjustment to post without approval.

3. Enter positive and negative approval tolerances If approval is required for adjustments out of tolerance you must
enter a value in at least one of these fields. You cannot update these values after you perform physical inventory adjustments.
Qty: Enter acceptable Positive and Negative limits (expressed as a percentage) for the difference between the system–tracked on–hand quantity and the actual tag count quantity.
Value: Enter acceptable Positive and Negative limits for the total value of a physical inventory adjustment.
4. Select the scope of the physical inventory.
Determines whether the physical inventory is for all subinventories or for one or more specific subinventories. Only enter a quantity tracked subinventory.

5. Indicate whether to allow dynamic entry of tags.
Determines whether you can dynamically enter tags you manually created. If you choose not to allow dynamic tag entry all tags must generated before use  If you do not want to allow dynamic tag entry but you need blank tags, you can generate numbered blank tags for counting miscellaneous items.

Taking a Snapshot of Inventory Quantities

Before you can generate tags for a physical inventory, you must take a snapshot of all system on–hand quantities for your items. The snapshot saves all current item on–hand quantities and costs. Oracle Inventory uses this information as the basis for all physical inventory adjustments. All tag counts you enter for this physical inventory are compared with these static quantities. This allows you to resume normal inventory operations after you have entered your counts but before you have authorized all final physical inventory adjustments. You can perform your recounts or investigate certain results without holding up transaction processing.
Notes :
1. Oracle Inventory does not stop inventory processing during a physical inventory. Therefore, you must procedurally coordinate the snapshot of your physical inventory with your actual counting, and ensure that no transaction activity occurs in a particular location until after you have performed your adjustments.
2. It is recommended to clear the Pending Transactions and Transactions Open Interface, before taking a snapshot of inventory.
To freeze the system on–hand quantities

1. Navigate to the Physical Inventories Summary folder window.
2. Select the physical inventory you want to use.
3. Choose Perform snapshot from the Tools menu. This launches the snapshot concurrent process.
Note: You can also choose Snapshot from the Define Physical Inventory window.
4. When the concurrent process is finished, re–query the physical inventory to see the effects of the snapshot. The effects include:

• The Snapshot Complete box is checked on the Physical Inventories Summary folder window.
• The Snapshot Complete box is checked, the Snapshot Date is updated, and the Tags button is enabled in the Define Physical Inventory window.

Generating Physical Inventory Tags

You use physical inventory tags to record the physical counts of inventory items. Physical inventory tags represent actual hard copy tags that some companies use to count inventory items. A tag contains the count for a group of a given item. Although you can record only one item on a tag, multiple tags can reference the same item, with each tag referring to a unique physical location for an item.

Note: A tag represent a single item number in a particular subinventory, locator with a given revision, lot, and serial number.
If we are not considering serial and lot number then the single TAG might have n number of items (in a particular sub-inventory, locator combinatio)

Oracle Inventory can generate default or blank tags for your physical inventory.
If you choose to generate default tags for each item, specify the starting tag number and the increment by which you want to increase each digit in the tag number. Your tag numbers may be alphanumeric, but you can increment only the numeric portion. The alphabetic characters in the tag number stay constant. Inventory then uses these tag numbers to generate a tag for every unique combination of item number, subinventory, locator,revision, lot, and serial number for which the system has an on–hand quantity not equal to zero.
If you want to have some empty tags handy to record counts for stock–keeping units for which Inventory has no on–hand quantity (and therefore does not generate default tags), you can generate blank tags. Inventory assigns tag numbers to blank tags, but does not include any item or location detail. You specify this information when you enter your tag counts. You can generate as many blank tags as you want.
You can also exclusively use blank tags to perform a physical inventory. If you need to perform a complete wall–to–wall physical inventory, you can go through your warehouse and attach blank tags to every item and/or location you see. As you perform the count, you record the item and stock–keeping unit information along with the actual on–hand quantity.

PI Tag Counts

Use the tags that you generated to record your physical counts. If you use default tags for your physical inventory, you can automatically query all tags and fill in the counts. You can also query a subset of your tags by any combination of tag number, item, revision, subinventory, locator, lot, and serial number. You would use this partial tag query feature if you prefer to enter your counts by location or item, or for a particular tag number range.
If you use any blank tags in your physical inventory, you can query up the tags by tag number. You can then enter the necessary item, revision, subinventory, locator, lot, and serial number information, as well as the actual count quantity and the name of the employee who performed the count.
If you enable dynamic tag entry for your physical inventory, you can enter counts for any item and stock–keeping unit combination without a pre–generated tag number.

Adjustments and Approval
Oracle Inventory uses the counts you enter for your tags to determine if your items need quantity adjustments; and if so, whether you need to approve them.
1. If you set your approval option for your physical inventory to Not required for adjustments, you are ready to process your
adjustments.
2. If you set your approval option to Required for adjustments out of tolerance, Oracle Inventory holds for approval all tags with counts that are outside the limits of the quantity variance or adjustment value tolerances.
3. If you set your approval option to Required for all adjustments, Oracle Inventory holds all counts for approval.
Void Tags
It is important for auditing purposes to track the status of each physical  inventory tag. Therefore, if you do not use one or more of the tags Oracle Inventory generates, you should void them in the Physical Inventory Tag Counts window. A voided tag is not reported as a missing tag in the Physical Inventory Missing Tag Listing.
If you generated a certain number of blank tags at the beginning of your physical inventory, and ended up not using all of them, you would void the unused tags. When you run the Physical Inventory Missing Tag Listing for the whole range of tags you initially generated, the unused ones are accounted for and appear as missing tags.
If you void a default tag, (i.e. a tag that identifies a stock–keeping unit for which there is system on–hand quantity), Oracle Inventory adjusts the quantity in that location to zero. This indicates that you did not use the tag in question, presumably because the stock–keeping unit corresponding to the tag did not exist.
Entering and Voiding Physical Inventory Tag Counts

Navigate to the Physical Inventory Tag Counts window or choose the Counts button from the Physical Inventories Summary folder window.
1. Enter the physical inventory.
2. Enter the employee that performed the physical inventory in the Default Counter field. Oracle Inventory uses this value as the default for the Counted By field of each tag.
3. Enter or query the tag numbers for which to enter counts using one of the following options:

• Choose the Find button. Choose Yes or No to query all tags. If you choose No, you can either enter tag numbers individually or use the Find feature on the Query menu to query a subset of tags.
• Enter tag numbers individually. You can enter existing tags individually. When you enter a tag number the item information for that tag appears.
• Use the Find feature on the Query menu. You can query a subset of tags matching the search criteria you enter in the find window.

You can search by any combination of tag number, item, revision, subinventory, locator, lot, serial number, or tag status. With tag status you can find voided or missing tags.
4. Enter counts for default tags: Since you generated default tags the item, revision, subinventory, locator, lot, and serial number information for each item is displayed. You enter the count Quantity, unit of measure (UOM), and Counted By information.
5. Enter counts for blank or dynamic tags

• Enter the item associated with the tag.
• Enter the revision of the item. You can enter a value here if the item is under revision quantity control.
• Enter the subinventory in which you counted the item.
• Enter the locator associated with the subinventory. You can enter a value here if the item is under locator control.
• Enter the count quantity (number counted) for the tag.
• Enter the count unit of measure (UOM).
• Enter the name of the employee who counted the item (Counted By).
• Enter the lot number associated with the item. This entry is required if the item is under lot number control.
• Enter the serial number associated with the item. This entry is required if the item is under serial number control.

6. Voiding Physical Inventory Tags
You can void tags that you deliberately discarded during the physical inventory. Voiding tags allows you to account for all tags; thus, any tag numbers that appear on the missing tag report are actually missing.

Approving Physical Inventory Adjustments

Approval Tolerances
Oracle Inventory supports two types of physical inventory approval tolerances. For each type, you can specify a positive and a negative limit. When a particular physical inventory tag count entry results in an adjustment that exceeds any one of these limits, you have a physical inventory adjustment that exceeds approval tolerances. Based on the approval option you chose when you defined your physical inventory, this adjustment is or is not held for approval.
If you decide that approval is required for adjustments out of tolerance you must enter at least one positive or negative value for one type of approval tolerance. The quantity variance tolerance is a user–defined limit for the  difference between the system–tracked on–hand quantity and the actual tag count quantity. You express positive and negative quantity
variance tolerances as percentages of the system on–hand quantity. You enter these percentages when defining your physical inventory.

The adjustment value tolerance is a user–defined limit for the total value of a physical inventory adjustment:

adj value = (system on–hand qty – actual count qty) x current cost,
where: – Current cost is the cost at inventory snapshot.

You express positive and negative adjustment value tolerances as amounts in your functional currency. You enter these tolerances when defining your physical inventory.
Approving Physical Inventory Adjustments

You can view, reject, or approve physical inventory adjustments pending approval. The adjustments you can view from this window are determined by the approval option you defined for your physical inventory. If you approve a particular adjustment, the Process Physical Inventory Adjustments program adjusts your inventory balance by that quantity. If you reject an adjustment, Oracle Inventory does not change the system on–hand quantity.
Notes:
1. Even after saving a count as approved/or rejeceted we can change the quantity in TAG count till the physical inventory adjustment is processed.
Example: we entered quantity 1 for item001 in tag count window and then saved it as approved in approve PI adjustment winodw. We can again go back and change the quantity of item001 and save it. if we requry the item in adjustment window then it would be shown in None status though previously we had saved it as approved.

Processing Physical Inventory Adjustments

After you finish entering all your tag counts and approving those adjustments that need approval, you can submit the process that automatically posts your physical inventory adjustments. Oracle Inventory automatically creates a material transaction adjusting the item quantity and debiting or crediting the adjustment account you specify for your physical inventory.

• If the count of an item matches the snapshot system on–hand quantity, there is no adjustment transaction posted.
• Once you run the adjustment program for your physical inventory, Oracle Inventory does not allow new tag generation or any further updates of tag counts. You are no longer able to make any changes to that physical inventory.
• Due to the irreversible nature of this program, Oracle Inventory posts no physical inventory adjustments if you have any adjustments that are still pending approval. You must approve or reject all of your adjustments before you can process them.
• You can preview your adjustments before actually posting them by running the Physical Inventory Adjustments Report. You can run the actual adjustment program after you have used the report to verify your tag quantities and the value impact of your adjustments.
• Once the process "Perform physical inventory Adjustments" is complete one can verify the physiacl inventory adjustment material transactions and corresponding distribution accountings in material distribution window.

Purging Physical Inventory Information

Use this form to purge a physical inventory definition from the database. Oracle Inventory deletes all information associated with the physical definition. However, the purge does not affect any adjustments or adjustment transactions made using the physical definition. Those adjustments are not changed. You can also purge just tags if you made a mistake and want to start over.