Client:		eskandar
Project:		Barcode Scanning Stock Management

Requirement:

An existing Microsoft Access database application was being used to manage customer orders and dispatches from the company’s warehouse. This process was labour intensive and as part of the company’s expansion more efficient methods of dispatching goods needed be found. Further, the company lacked any management information on the value of stock at any point in time. The client wished to develop the existing application to generate barcodes for stock items; print labels complete with barcodes and provide full barcode-enabled stock control from goods in to goods out.

Azara Logic Process:

• Analysis

  In conjunction with the customer, Azara Logic identified and named six different business processes that involved stock movement between goods in and goods out. These business processes were documented using UML modelling and use cases to clarify the processes for all involved. The customer was growing rapidly and had no formal business processes in place at the time.

• Project Management

  The client was using a range of IT service providers for different aspects of its business. Different suppliers were responsible for the desktops, servers and software, the network and security and the barcode printing and scanning hardware, in addition to Azara Logic. Azara Logic took the lead in project managing the changes to the stock control system, ensuring that all parties were kept informed via monthly supplier meetings that were initiated at our suggestion.

• Delivery

  Azara Logic developed code to generate barcodes based on stock code, colour and size of garment. We then liaised with a third party supplier to write code to generate printer command lines to physically print the bar-coded labels. The solution incorporated a user interface, business objects and back end database code to handle logging of stock movements from goods in, within the warehouse and out to customers, including writing off stock and stock takes. We also worked closely with the company providing the scanning solution to provide them with stored procedures to enforce transaction handling to ensure database integration.

• Support

  Azara Logic provided the client with a business deployment plan template to ensure that all the business issues involved in the new software implementation were addressed prior to installation. This whole project represented a big change in business processes internally, as well as in software. Once the software was ready for deployment we provided post-implementation support and training to ensure satisfactory adoption of the system.

Success:

The new system has speeded up the dispatch process significantly allowing the whole process to be less time intensive and ultimately contributing to the company’s bottom line. Further at any point in time a stock level report identifies stock value and stock ‘on-hand’, thereby allowing it to be assigned to a customer more easily. A further success is the confidence that staff have in the system. When the auditors visit, staff are now confident that they can check any area of the warehouse and the stock levels will be accurate. Since this implementation the client has identified the need for a scanning application in its retail business and has asked Azara Logic to write the whole application, rather than use the company that provides the scanning hardware.