How stock is held
Branches are your locations and warehouses hold the stock. Each branch gets a default warehouse, and you can add more. Each item is set up as standard, serialised, batch controlled, expiry controlled or a service.
Stock is always counted in the smallest unit. With pack sizes on, you can buy and sell by the box or the piece at the right price, and the item page shows both, for example "53 pcs = 5 box + 3 pcs".
- Serial numbers: captured on receipt and chosen on sale, with each unit's history. Suited to motorcycles, generators and phones, and to chassis and engine numbers.
- Batches and expiry: without a chosen batch, the first to expire goes out first.
- Costing: weighted average, FIFO layers or standard cost.
- Availability: each warehouse shows on hand, committed to open orders, promised or coming on transfers, and available.
Moving and counting stock
- Transfers: direct between warehouses you are assigned to, at the same cost.
- Transfer requests: ask another branch for stock. It is approved first, and the stock moves only when the transfer is posted, up to what was approved. You can require a request for every transfer between branches.
- Receipts and issues: for stock in or out without a purchase or sale, such as damage or own use, with a reason.
- Stock counts: count by warehouse, including blind counts that hide system quantities until someone allowed reveals them. Posting corrects both stock and the accounts.
- Reorder levels: items falling below their level can notify buyers on their phones, and they appear in the reorder analysis and in production planning.
The purchase flow
| Step | Who usually does it | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Purchase requisition | Anyone allowed to ask | Goes for approval. Nothing is committed |
| Purchase order | Buyer | Sent to the supplier by print or email |
| Goods received note | Storekeeper | Stock rises. Part deliveries are fine. Serials captured |
| Supplier invoice | Finance | Supplier is owed the total |
| Supplier payment | Finance | Tick invoices. The amount leaves the bank and shows in Treasury |
| Goods return or credit note | Storekeeper or Finance | Stock or what you owe falls |
Imports and landed cost
An import record links the purchase documents under one reference. Goods are received into a goods-in-transit warehouse and cannot be sold there. Freight, duty and clearing are posted as supplier invoices on the import, or as provisions if the bill has not arrived.
Costing shares those costs over the goods by value or quantity. Where items pay different duty rates, you can enter each item's tariff code and duty from the customs entry instead. Release then moves the goods to a selling warehouse at the new cost. Costs arriving after costing go to variances, so they are not lost.
Where the bank is involved, the Letters of credit module follows an import LC from application to settlement, including converting it into a trade-finance loan. Import reports compare FOB with landed cost by import, supplier and origin.
Key suppliers
Dealers can see a key supplier's stock, place orders and follow dispatch and delivery on one shared record, and suppliers have their own portal. A supplier with its own system can feed stock and dealer prices by API.
Getting started
Products import from an Excel template. A shop can bring in opening stock with quantities and costs alone. A larger business can use the full opening balances tool. Default roles for Procurement and Storekeeper come ready and can be changed.
Where Navigate may not fit
- Stock is tracked to warehouse level. There are no built-in bin locations or guided picking routes.
- Requests for quotation are not a separate document in the current purchase flow.
- The supplier performance report, covering lead times and fill rate, is listed as planned and is not available yet.
- Serial-numbered items cannot use pack sizes.
- Stock screens need a connection. Stock levels are not kept on the phone for offline use.
- Imports starts from the Multi-Branch plan.
Frequently asked questions
Can I see stock at other branches?
Yes, read-only, unless your administrator denies it. Seeing it does not let you sell or move it, but you can request a transfer from the same screen.
Can we sell stock we do not have?
Not by default. Selling without stock is a control that is off unless given. A van can never sell more than it carries, whatever the setting.
Can it handle chassis and engine numbers?
Yes. Serialised items carry them from receipt to sale, and the Trade & Serial plan is built around this.
How does Navigate work out the unit cost?
It follows your costing method: weighted average, FIFO or standard. Imported goods take on their landed cost when the import is costed.