Work orders
Turn components into finished products — a gift set from its parts, a kit from its pieces — and carry the cost of what was used into what was made.
On every plan. Assembly & BOM is included in Starter, Standard, Growth and Pro — there is nothing to switch on.
Set up a bill of materials
- Create the finished product with the type Assembly BOM (see Add a product).
- On its Bill of materials tab, add each component and how many of it one build uses.
- Set the yield — how many finished units one build makes.
- Save the product. A product can have more than one recipe.
Build with a work order
- Open Work orders → Assembly and click + New work order.
- Choose the bill of materials and the quantity to build. The order starts as Planned.
- Got the number wrong? Click Change next to the quantity while the order is still planned, and save the new figure. Nothing has been used yet, so there is nothing to unpick.
- When the components are ready, build it. Components come out of stock, the finished units go in, and the work order becomes Complete.
The finished product is costed at what its components actually cost — including any labour or overhead lines on the recipe — divided by the yield.
Built before a component had a cost? The build still goes through — stock is stock, whether or not you know what it cost yet. The finished units are left uncosted, and as soon as the missing cost arrives (usually with the supplier's invoice) Syncendio values that build and puts it through the books for you. You don't need to rebuild or re-enter anything.
Not enough components? The build is refused and tells you which component is short, so nothing is half-built.
Batch numbers and best-before dates
If the product you are making is tracked by batch or by serial number, the work order asks for the details before it will build. Which boxes appear depends on how that product is costed, and the method is shown next to its name so you can see why you are being asked.
| How the product is tracked | What the build asks for |
|---|---|
| FIFO Batch | A batch or lot number |
| FEFO Batch | A batch or lot number, and a best-before date |
| Special Batch | A batch or lot number, and a best-before date |
| FIFO Serial | One serial number for every unit being made |
| FEFO Serial | One serial number for every unit, and a best-before date |
| FIFO (no tracking) | Nothing — build straight away |
Use the number you will actually write on the finished units. It is what a recall notice would name and what a stock count is matched against. Serial numbers go one per line, and the box tells you how many are still needed.
Why the best-before matters. Products set to FEFO are sold nearest-expiry-first. Without a date Syncendio cannot put the units in the right order, and they would end up being sold last instead of first.
Syncendio will not invent a serial number for you. A serial is a marking on a physical unit, so a made-up one would be printed on nothing in the warehouse.
Check before you build
The cost table on a work order shows an Available column next to Needed, so you can see a shortage before you press Build rather than after.
Available is what this build can actually draw on: what is on hand at the location, less anything already picked for a customer's order. A line that is short is shown in red, and hovering it tells you whether the stock is simply not there or is there but spoken for — which is the difference between ringing a supplier and looking at a sales order.
After a build: cost, history, undo
A completed work order has three tabs.
- Build — the components, what they cost, and the finished units.
- Financial — exactly what the build put through the books: the components coming out of stock, the finished goods going in, and the value moved between the accounts.
- Log — who raised the work order, who built it, and when.
Built something by mistake? Use Undo. The components go back on the shelf, the finished units come off, and the accounting entry is reversed — so both the original and the reversal stay on file. Undo is refused if the finished units have already been sold or used in another build, and it says which.
Void is the stronger option: it removes the accounting entry altogether, as though the build had never been put through the books. Use it only for a build that should never have existed, and only while the period is still open. Voiding asks for a reason and keeps it.
Disassembly
To take finished units apart again — to sell the parts separately or recover them from a return — use Work orders → Disassembly. The finished units come out of stock and the components go back in.
A disassembly works the same way as a build: change the quantity with Change while it is still planned, and once it has run its Financial tab shows what it put through the books and its Log shows who ran it. It can be undone on the same terms — provided the recovered components have not already been sold or used.