Mobiledock is able to validate purchase orders (PO), sales orders (SO), transport orders (TO), advanced shipment notices (ASN) during the booking process to ensure only required goods are delivered, and when you want them delivered. Enhancing inventory control and delivery accuracy. Dock appointment scheduling with Mobiledock, integrated directly with your ERP/WMS can help with inventory control and warehouse operations in several ways.

Efficient Unloading

By scheduling appointments for trucks and deliveries, you can ensure that each truck arrives at the dock at a designated time. This helps in streamlining the unloading process, reducing wait times, and minimizing congestion at the loading docks. When unloading is efficient, it can help prevent bottlenecks and ensure that inventory is received promptly.

Prioritisation of High-Priority Shipments

Dock appointment scheduling allows you to prioritise high-priority shipments. If certain inventory items are critical or have specific handling requirements, you can schedule their deliveries during times when the appropriate resources and personnel are available. This ensures that important inventory items are handled with care and received on time.

Reduced Holding Costs

Advanced visibility of inbound inventory is crucial to reducing the total stock held in your warehouse/s. More stock means more warehouse space, higher capital in stock, higher insurance, higher depreciation and obsolescence costs, and increased opportunity for leakage.

With Mobiledock, you get days to weeks of inbound inventory arrival visibility. This has led to Mobiledock customers decreasing the days of inventory held, without an increased risk of stockouts.

Minimising inventory holding costs is essential for businesses to remain competitive, as excessive holding costs can erode profit margins and lead to inefficiencies. Effective inventory management strategies, like just-in-time (JIT) or inventory turnover optimisation, help in reducing these costs.

Resource Allocation

Dock scheduling helps you allocate your labour and equipment resources more effectively. By knowing when trucks are expected, you can schedule the appropriate number of staff and equipment to handle the incoming shipments. This prevents overallocation or underallocation of resources, which can impact inventory control.

Reduced Stockouts

With better control over when inventory arrives, you can minimize the risk of stockouts. Stockouts occur when demand exceeds supply, which can result in lost sales and dissatisfied customers. Proper dock appointment scheduling ensures that inventory arrives in a timely manner, reducing the likelihood of stockouts.

Improved Inventory Accuracy

When inventory is received in an organized and scheduled manner, it's easier to maintain accurate records. This reduces the chances of discrepancies between the expected and actual inventory levels, helping you maintain more accurate and reliable inventory records.

Space Optimization

Dock appointment scheduling can help optimize the use of warehouse space. By coordinating deliveries and unloading times, you can ensure that space is efficiently utilized, minimizing the need for additional storage space and associated costs.

Demand Forecasting

Accurate scheduling data can be used for better demand forecasting. By tracking when shipments are expected and when they are received, you can refine your demand forecasting models, leading to more accurate inventory replenishment decisions.

Supplier Accountability

Dock appointment scheduling also holds suppliers accountable for timely deliveries. When suppliers know that you have a well-organized scheduling system, they are more likely to adhere to the agreed-upon delivery times, reducing the risk of delayed shipments.

With Mobiledock, warehouse operations are able to create rules which allow for both broad and very granular conditions for approval of stock being delivered. These rules can go down to the individual purchase order, or even to the stock keeping unit (SKU), allowing you to define prioritization of goods from individual suppliers or for individual products.

In a retail environment, this can provide enormous value, especially at times of sales promotions or seasonal events. Rules could define that Christmas trees are important leading up to Christmas. Or televisions should be prioritized leading up to a Black Friday sale.

Dock appointment scheduling with Mobiledock can significantly contribute to better inventory control by improving the efficiency of receiving operations, reducing holding costs, optimizing resource allocation, and enhancing overall inventory accuracy. This, in turn, helps organizations maintain the right levels of inventory, minimize stockouts, and improve customer satisfaction.