Inventory reports

Valuation

Inventory → Valuation values the stock held, using the valuation method set in inventory settings.

This is the figure that goes into the accounts as closing stock, so run it at term end and at year end, immediately after a physical count. A valuation run before the count values figures you already know to be wrong.

Low stock

Inventory → Low Stock Items lists everything at or below its reorder level.

This is the reordering list. Work it weekly — the reorder level was set to give you time to order, and that time is only useful if someone looks.

If the list is permanently long, the reorder levels are wrong rather than the school being permanently short. Review them.

Overdue

Inventory → Overdue lists purchase orders past their delivery date.

Chase from this list. An order that is three weeks late and nobody has noticed is the normal way a term runs out of exercise books.

Department consumption

Inventory → Department Consumption reports what each department has drawn from stores over a period.

This is the report that makes stores management useful to the school rather than to the storekeeper. It shows:

• What each department costs to run in consumables.
• How that compares to the same period last year, and to other departments.
• Where consumption has jumped without an obvious reason.

Consumption is attributed by the issues recorded, so it is only as good as the discipline of issuing. A department that collects goods without an issue note appears to cost nothing.

Student-sales profit

Inventory → Student Sales includes a live sales report for the chosen period. It shows sales revenue, cost of goods sold, gross profit and gross margin, together with the highest-selling items. See Selling inventory to students for how costs and voided receipts are treated.

Canteen sales and PDQ reconciliation

Inventory → Canteen → Reports shows canteen revenue, cost, gross profit, payment mix and customer mix for the selected period. Its sales register records the cashier, outlet, recipient and payment references. The PDQ terminals section totals card receipts per registered terminal and highlights assisted entries awaiting reconciliation against the acquirer’s settlement report. See Canteen.

Inventory → Canteen → Stock reports each outlet’s quantity, value, reorder level, low or out-of-stock items and its movement register. The register separates transfers, sales, void returns and physical-count adjustments. Export the current outlet view to PDF or Excel for a stock count or management review.

Exporting reports

Use PDF for a print-ready report and Excel when you need to filter or reconcile the figures. Wide inventory reports automatically use landscape orientation and tuned column widths so descriptions and amounts remain readable.

The supplier balances export includes supplier name, KRA PIN, category, contact person, phone, email, payment terms, balance due and credit available. Review the filter and as-at date before exporting; both are carried into the report.

Reading these together

The four reports answer different questions, and the useful work is in the contradictions between them:

• Valuation says what is held; the count says whether that is true.
• Low stock says what to buy; consumption says whether the school actually uses it.
• Overdue says what has not arrived; low stock says whether that matters yet.

An item consistently on the low stock list with no consumption behind it is being over-stocked. An item with high consumption and no reorder level set is one that will run out unannounced.