Keeping an Eye on Your Inventories With Inventory Software From Timly

Stocktaking, Inventories, Balance Sheet – Definition of Terms

The term stocktaking (inventory) has – depending on the context – a slightly different meaning. Colloquially, it refers to the totality of objects that can be assigned to a person or a company. In companies, this includes furniture, work equipment, but also permanently installed components and consumables.

According to the law, the inventories include all types of fixed and current assets, outstanding receivables as well as the cash assets and debts of a company. It indicates the available values of a business. Since these fluctuate, every businessman is obliged to survey the current status of his assets as well as long-term debts and short-term debts once a year on an inventories balance sheet, at the end of the business year. This must be done by counting, measuring or weighing as part of the stocktaking process.

The stocktaking describes the process of drawing up the inventories by bringing the list of assets and debts up to date. Conversely, this means that the permanent recording of a company’s assets in an inventory software greatly simplifies the inventories or even makes it superfluous in parts.

Inventories, Inventory – Difference and Similarities

There is a difference between inventories and inventory (stocktaking) stocktaking in terms of content. Nevertheless, the terms cannot be separated from each other. Merchants are obliged by law to regularly draw up their inventories, insofar as they are not allowed to determine their surplus by means of a simple profit and loss account. For this purpose, a physical inventory must be taken in the form of a stocktaking to determine the assets and liabilities.

The inventory software from Timly consequently does not separate these two areas. Its claim is rather to be able to reflect the current inventory of all assets of a company at any time. In addition, it is possible to manage locations and allocations.

Ultimately, Timly’s stocktaking software package serves as the basis for storing any information relevant to a company about its work equipment, inventory items and articles intended for sale. This means that it is always possible to see where inventories are and what condition they are in. During a stocktaking, the time-consuming process of creating lists and searching for recorded assets is eliminated.

In addition, Timly offers convenience functions in its inventory software to simplify the stocktaking process. These include the inventory mode, which allows items to be ticked off by simply scanning a QR code, and the practical self-inventory. This is a feature that allows employees in the home office or on assembly to carry out independent inventories of the work equipment left to them in a legally compliant manner.

Inventories: Use Software for Management

For the comprehensive management of inventories to be possible with a software, it must be able to map the most diverse assets in a meaningful way. This can be easily implemented in Timly’s inventory management through customisable categories. These can be designed according to a company’s needs.

Simple inventories such as furniture only need a few entries, for example manufacturer, condition and location. For complex work equipment, on the other hand, it makes sense to store detailed information such as operating instructions, maintenance instructions and inspection records. Flexible, personal allocation also often makes sense in this case. In practice, personal responsibility ensures more careful handling of assigned work equipment. In order to keep the administrative effort for this manageable, further prerequisites are necessary.

Central storage space for inventory management is essential. Timly uses a cloud solution. This is designed to be GDPR-compliant and has an authorisation concept with which employees are only granted the necessary access rights. For the easy identification of an asset, they are provided with a QR code when they are first recorded, which is attached in the form of a space-saving sticker. Afterwards, the profile of each inventory item can be accessed by scanning the QR code.

An app optimised for smartphones and tablets ensures better usability. Employees can access the database of inventories from almost any location. All that is required is an internet connection. Updating information becomes very easy. Work equipment can be allocated in real time via the app. The same applies to reporting defects or logging maintenance.

Experience has shown that simple handling increases acceptance among employees and thus improves the quality of the data stock. In addition, the use of a cloud-based solution with a smartphone app simplifies every form of stocktaking. Once switched to inventory mode, every asset can be recorded with the smartphone – no matter where it is.

Special Case IT – High Flexibility Required for Recording

A not inconsiderable amount of IT work equipment is given to employees to take with them to the home office or other external workplaces. Managing the locations and licence periods for these hardware and software components is a real challenge. Timly has created the container property for objects for this purpose. This allows virtual workstations to be created to which other objects are permanently assigned. This way it is always clear which licence is linked to which hardware and which inventories are in the personal possession of an employee.

The same applies to permanently installed hardware, such as components of the network infrastructure. This can be recorded per room with Timly. This way, there is no risk of hardware or software being overlooked.

For example, SodaStream Germany, the well-known manufacturer of sparkling water makers, has greatly minimised its administrative effort through the innovative self-inventory function. Now, employees in the home office can also easily scan their IT inventory and thus accelerate the inventory processes.