The Federal Government announced a ​tax deduction for Australian small business to support technology and training investment in this financial year. Further information here.

This is fantastic news for companies who want to embrace new technology and invest in digital technology.

If you have been waiting to implement a Warehouse Management Solution now is the time. Contact our sales team on [email protected]
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A Warehouse Management Solution (WMS) is required when the current ERP (Accounting System) cannot adequately manage inventory, operations and process. Warehouses can benefit from a WMS system especially if there has been an increase in labour costs. With the current environment many distribution businesses are growing dramatically. With this there is a key need for operational accuracies, as picking accuracy can be fairly significant issues not only for customer satisfaction but also regard to carrying costs and overall labour needs.

ERP Systems often struggle with warehouse management. Even with the latest releases today of some ERP's such as Netsuite, MYOB Advanced they typically do not have the capabilities to manage the complexities of modern warehouses. For example, many ERP's and ERP WMS modules struggle with managing all the tracking of inventory movements. You may need to run replenishment with FIFO rules and track pallets by bin location. With the current environment there is a complete need for pallet management in the warehouse and manage slotting.

We also see ERP WMS modules have trouble handling catch weight. The inability to manage multiple units of measure properly, such as product is ordered in units and invoiced in weight. From here the ERP WMS modules struggle to scan and capture the number of cartons and capturing the weight for each carton and parsing this information back to the ERP. Typically we see the need to manage GS-1 128, 2D and HIBC barcodes in the food and medical industry as well.

From experience the ERP WMS modules seem to typically rely on manual data entry and redundant steps. Best of Breed WMS will allow for scanning at all operations including command barcodes. There will also be an audit on all scans to capture information for KPI's and dashboards.

With Labour Costs growing disproportionately with revenue and volume growth, only the right WMS system can level the playing field. Our WMS from The RIC Group can help improve operational accuracies, order fill rate and lower labour costs.

The other point that is really important is to choose a WMS that can meet your needs today and scale over time.
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Since Covid-19 pandemic most organisations no longer have the resources to spend big on WMS implementations so what will the ROI be on the WMS project is an important question. At The RIC Group we have always believed in an incremental approach for WMS projects. 

Our WMS and TMS projects always use an intelligent phased implementation. We  deliver an agile and phased approach while transforming businesses to drive results. The Intelligent Phased approach to implementation allows customers to go live quickly, allows customers to drive fast time to value and better ROI.

The gain of investment is the amount of money you stand to gain from implementing the new software system. When implementing Warehouse Management Solution one of the safeguards the right WMS solution will do is dramatically reduce the number of returns you receive from your customers. The money you don't pay in credits and the time for processing the return is a gain in investment.

WMS should bring in efficiencies. It is important to remember where all the efficiencies come in as well when implementing a Warehouse Management Solution. When processing orders manually customers should remember that often pieces of paper are printed, and then written on by pickers and packers, and then administration staff receive the paper and have to then manually enter in the information from the piece of paper. The printing of pick slips, writing on paper and staff then entering the information back into the ERP manually can be automated. With The RIC Group's WMS there is automation. The picking slips are displayed automatically digitally on the RF or Tablet device, capturing the pick and pack qty's are through the WMS and the update to the ERP is completed via automation. This means there is efficiencies gained in the overall process of picking orders. In other instances the Warehouse Management Solution could be replacing an older WMS which is costing money to run. The money you will not spend to run the old system will also be a gain of investment.
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With overall efficiencies there is a decrease in costs.

Cost of the investment is the money you spend on implementing and maintaining the new software system. There can be additional costs which are above the licencing fees, support, subscription and deployment. When staff are training in the new system, educating themselves on the new system this is opportunity cost. There will be a period of diminished productivity during this time as well while staff adjust to the new system.