Bill Of Materials¶

How to set up 'Bill Of Materials'

Bills of Materials can be calculated in order detail lines if the ‘Stock Control’ flag is switched on in Blind Details > Blind Types:

Stock Items

Stock records are held in Stock Setup > Stock Items. The two important fields in the stock item regarding quantity calculation are ‘Calculator’ and 'Default Code':

The calculator is a lookup field and is used to select a type of formula that can be used to calculate stock.
The ‘Default Code’ is used to define the add ons and multipliers that can be applied to the calculators.
These can be found in Stock Setup > Dimension Calculations. In the example below, there is a record set up for calculator = ‘Width & Drop’.
If the default code is set to A in the bill of materials, then in this example, the quantity used will be calculated as (Drop * 2) + (Width * 2).

Some of the calculators that are used look up further tables.
For example, ‘Width Variable’ looks up Administration > System Tables > Values For Variable Width Calculator.
This will determine how many units of a component are used depending on the width of a blind.
The stock item being used must be set up with ‘Calculator’ = Width Variable, and the ‘Default Code’ set to the relevant table code.
Here are the other calculators that can be used:

Setting Up the Bill of Materials

There are four places where the bill of materials can be generated from.

Fabric / Slat

When you enter a detail line, you must enter a fabric/slat.
This will calculate a bill of the material record. If the blind type is Venetian, the calculator for the slat should be ‘Slats x Slat Width’.
If it is a vertical blind type, the calculator should be ‘Louvres x Fabric Length’, and if it is a roller then the calculator should be ‘Width’, ‘Width or Drop’ or ‘Drop’, depending on the roller fabric itself.

Default

There may be some stock items that are used in the making of the blind, regardless of the fabric or options selected.
These can be entered against the blind type record, in the ‘Stock Defaults’ tab. In here you can define the calculator and the default code.

Option

Some options may be for actual stock items and others may just be descriptive fields that hold additional items against them.
For example, ‘Left Bunch’ is not a stock item, so would not generate a bill of materials record (it would be flagged as a non-stock item in the stock record).
‘Face Fix Brackets’ is an actual stock item so it will calculate the bill of materials based on the calculator held against the stock item.
‘White Headrail’ is a descriptive item and also non-stock, but it may have additional items against it.

Additional

If a stock record is selected by one of the above methods (Fabric, Default or Option), it might also use stock items that are tied to that stock item.
These are held in the ‘Additional Options’ tab in the stock record.

Entering Orders and Calculating Bill of Materials

When you are entering an order detail line, records will generate for a bill of materials based on the blind type selected, the fabric selected and the options are chosen.
A typical BOM will look like this (the example is for a roller blind).

The ‘Link Type’ column shows how the bill of material record was generated.
‘Fabric’ means that it comes directly from the fabric entered, ‘Default’ means that it is picked up from the ‘Stock Default’ tab in the ‘Blind Type’ form.
The ‘Option’ means that is comes directly from the options selected and ‘Additional’ means that it is tied to one of the other stock items already selected.
If you look at the ‘Parent Code’ column, you will see that the last two records have been chosen because stock item ‘1022’ had already been chosen.
These records can be found in Stock Items > Additional Options tab.
This bill of materials is displayed by clicking on the ‘View’ bill of materials button in the window blind amend form in order entry:

It is possible to make amendments to the bills of materials calculations by selecting the relevant BOM record and then clicking on the ‘Stock Items’.
For ‘Fabric’ and ‘Option’ generated records, the calculator can be changed.
In the case of ‘Default’ and ‘Additional’ records, you will need to go to Blind Types > Stock Defaults and Stock Items > Additional Options respectively.

Order Processing > Orders > BOM

There is a new user permission to allow a user to amend the Quantity in a fabric BOM record.
If the quantity is amended, all of the other detail lines with the same fabric have their quantity set to 0 and the 'Manually Changed' flag in the BOM record set to true for all of these detail lines.

The new permission is called 'Edit Fabric BOM Qty' and defaults to false.
It is not possible to edit the fabric quantity after the blind has been manufactured (or if 'Update Stock At WIP' then after 'Work In Progress').