Your first stock count

This tutorial takes you from an empty stock ledger to balances you can trust. You record the opening balance once, then learn the two counts you will use every week.

Who this is for: managers and anyone who counts stock.

You will need: a phone, access to each storage area, and about an hour for a small outlet.

Before you start

Your onboarding team has loaded the stock catalogue: items, units, storage areas and suppliers. Open Stock › Items and skim the list. If an item you hold is missing, ask an owner to add it under Settings › Inventory › Catalogue before you count. Catalogue changes ask for a second factor.

Step 1. Record the opening balance

The opening balance is the cutover from your old records. It is done once per outlet.

1. Open Stock › Opening balance on your phone.
2. Search or scroll to the first storage area. Items are listed in the order you walk the area.
3. For each item, enter the quantity you can see. The unit is shown beside the line. If you count cartons but the item is kept in kilograms, enter the carton count and the conversion factor when the sheet asks.
4. Move to the next area. The sticky footer shows how many items are counted and how many remain.
5. Submit when you have finished every area.

Step 2. Read the confidence badge

Open Stock › Items. Each balance carries a badge: high, medium, low or unknown. Tap it. The popover explains the basis, for example "last physical countdays ago; recipe mapping 91%", and names the action that would raise it.

Right after the opening balance every badge is high. From now on, deliveries and approved invoices add stock, sales through recipes remove it, and the badge drifts down until the next count.

Step 3. Run a spot count

A spot count checks a handful of items without stopping the kitchen.

1. Open Stock › Spot count.
2. Search for the item. The last known quantity is shown beside the line.
3. Enter what you see and submit.

The balance updates and the badge goes back to high. Do this for your five most valuable items every few days.

Step 4. Run a full stocktake

A stocktake counts everything and produces a variance.

1. Open Stock › Stocktake at the end of the week, after the last delivery and before service.
2. Walk each area as you did for the opening balance. Do not leave lines blank; enter zero if the item is gone.
3. Submit. The server computes the variance between what the ledger expected and what you counted, and hands it to the variance report.

Nothing is overwritten. The count, the invoices and the balance each keep their own record, so you can always see why a number moved.

Step 5. Log waste and expiry

• Stock › Waste records anything thrown away, with a reason. This is what explains a variance before anyone assumes theft.
• Stock › Expiry lists items expiring in 2,anddays.

What you have learned

• The opening balance is a one-time cutover.
• Spot counts keep the important balances trustworthy between stocktakes.
• The stocktake produces a variance; waste logs explain it.
• Every balance says what it is based on.

Next steps

• Receive a delivery
• Run a stocktake
• Log waste