Warehouse and Operations as a Career and the 2nd quarter of

2019!  I’m Marty T Hawkins and I

appreciate you checking in with us today! 

So how’d the last 13 weeks treat you? 

I hope it was Productive and Prosperous, did you stick to your plan,

obtain all those 1st quarter goals? 

We’ve received so many messages about pay increases and advancements

made, keep up the good work!  If your

plan was a little more aggressive and your still working it, stick to your plan

and you’ll see results!  The important

thing to remember is don’t get discouraged, stay true to your plan and success

will come, we’re in it for the long haul, it’s a career we’re chasing, we have

38 more weeks to work it this year. 

We’re all going to successful, we’ve got a plan right?

we want to talk about today… I had a few questions about  Inventory Control, Driver Checkin and the

Returns Positions so lets start there today. 

All of these are kind of linked anyway, I mean they all deal with our

companies financial departments. 

Depending on what industry your in or what kind of product you’ll be

working with the specific SOP’s or standard operating procedures will of course

be a bit different but overall I think we can talk about what the job could

entail. 

the Driver Check-in position.  In a

smaller facility this may just be an additional task we’ll be assigned each

day, where as in our larger operations it’ll be a full time position, maybe

it’ll be its own department even.  I’ve

see facilities that require 3 or 4 people manning the docks to assist our

drivers as they return from their daily routes. 

Think about a distribution center that sends out 100 loads each

day.  As those drivers are out making

their deliveries, they’re going to be making adjustments to customers invoices,

maybe accepting partial pay’s, adjustments to credits owed the customer,

accepting money orders, checks and even cash. 

If you’ve ever been  or known a

delivery driver, Oh my gosh, the horror stories they can tell of how a salesman

may have missed giving a customer a credit on a return or forgot to apply a

discount to an invoice and how of course the driver gets the lecture from the

customer.  Now it’s the drivers

responsibility to get authorization to make any adjustments to an account but

its going to happen, and its going to happen daily, hence why we need the

driver check in task.  There’s some

really slick systems today.  If our

company utilizes a connected WMS or warehouse management system our drivers may

have a electronic tablet that can collect signatures, apply return or

adjustment codes, some of these can even accept payments as well!  But what I see out in the field mostly are

the old school paper invoices, I think in the distribution and delivery fields

we’re still catching up to the world of possibilities.  Anyway, so our drivers will be making those

adjustments with pen and paper.  Drivers

are in a hurry all day, you can imagine what those invoices can look like after

being carried around in the cab of a tractor for 10 hours!  So our driver has delivered his or her whole

load, made all their stops and returns to the warehouse to turn everything

in.  We’ll be their first stop after

backing in at the dock upon their return. 

The driver check-in clerk works closely with the transportation

department, its drivers and Supervisors, but they also will need to be able to

communicate with the sales team,  they’ll

need to sort out any credits and discounts given and adjusted.  We’ll also be working with, and maybe even

reporting to our financial departments, AP/AR etc.  I know one medium sized facility where the

Driver check-in clerk reports to the CFO. 

It’s our job to reconcile those invoices with the customers account, dig

the particulars from the driver and then report any and all discrepancies.  The driver check-in position is very

important.  It’s a great lead-in task to

the world of inventory control or a career in to accounting too. 

coordinator we may work closely beside the driver check in person.  Our driver may have some product returned by

the customer for a refund or credit to their accounts, maybe the warehouse has mis

shipped an item, or the warehouse might of mis loaded something, or the driver

could have damaged a case.  Our drivers

will inevitably be bringing product back. 

And that’s where we’ll step in as a returns clerk.  Again, in a smaller house we could be the

check in person and the returns clerk but the duties are pretty much the same

as the larger more defined role houses. 

Returns departments are responsible for the disposition of the

return.  If the merchandise is in good

shape and resaleable we’ll need to make sure the count is added back into the

inventory so it can be resold.  If it’s

damaged, dated or maybe out of its original packaging, otherwise cannot be

restocked it’s our job document it disposition. 

Many houses may donate items or sale them to discount houses.  If we determine its to be restocked by us

we’ll follow the stocking procedure at our facility to get back to the pick

location and putaway.  A piece of that

procedure will be notifying Inventory Control to ensure it’s count is added to

the Inventory.  The returns department

can be one of those first positions for us. 

Although I wouldn’t consider it a general labor position, it is a great

starter job for those that like paperwork and can keep things organized and enjoys

following directions.  We’ll get a little

exposure to other warehouse positions and quite possibly a little equipment

usage like and electric walkie or rider jack. 

From here we can easily move into a Warehouse role, or into

transportation or maybe into the financial side of the business like Inventory

Control!

Control, lets see, where to start. 

Inventory control, at least in our larger facilities may consist of two

departments or segments of positions.  Of

course you have the financial side, responsible for the inventory, reconciling

its in and out of the building movements, the cycle counting programs or the

physical counts of every item.  This

group is responsible of putting items into inventory or taking items out of

inventory or all adjustments due to damages, spoilage, lost product etc, really

every adjustment to inventory except its initial entry into the building which

of course our Warehouse Receiver position performs.  This group usually reports to the CFO or

their departments.  Then you may have a

Warehouse Inventory Control position.  I

held this position once for about 4 years. 

I really enjoyed it and learned a lot about, well a lot about a little I

guess, the accounting responsibilities. 

I would get a sheet of all the short on trucks for the day and have to

go out and count pick slots to see if they were a case heavy.  If a driver gets to a stop and lets say they

ordered 10 cases of green beans but there’s only 9 on the truck.  He’s going to mark it or code it as short on

truck on the invoice.  At the end of the

day the driver is going to tell the Driver check-in person that he or she only

had 9 cases of green beans on the truck and the warehouse shorted him 1

case.  The invoice to the customer is

going to be adjusted so at this point the missing case of green beans is a loss

to the company.  A count would be

triggered by the warehouse management system and I’d go out and count the

slot.  If it was 1 case over we could

assume the selector had only grabbed 9 cases and I’d ask Inventory Control to

add 1 case back into the machine, correcting our inventory count.  If the slot count was correct, or had the

quantity that the machine thought was there then we’d assume the driver had

misdelivered it, maybe to another customer, meaning they may have received 1 more

case of green beans than they had ordered and paid for.  In this case transportation would be dinged

for the cost of the case.  It was also my

responsibility to find lost product.  If

a forklift driver had scanned the wrong slot location during putaway or placed

it in the wrong aisle or maybe the replenishment driver had placed a pallet

into the wrong selection slot.  I had to

go throughout the warehouse and find those errors.  Basically I had to have all the answers for

the accountants when it came to what’d operations do with this product.  I loved the job.  I had the opportunity to work with the

merchandisers, accounting, transportation and the warehouse.  Inventory control is a great stepping stone

in our plan.  You can quite literally go

in any direction within the company from here!

how all three of these positions, Driver Check-in, Returns clerk and Inventory

Control, work closely with each other, their all about reconciling inventory,

monies and the finances.  All from within

the realm of warehouse.  I’ve seen them

all be filled by a newbie to the business too. 

It’s not uncommon at all to fill one of these jobs right from the

street, no experience required.  And

they’ll all give us a little equipment experience eventually.  I think their all three great 1st

positions.  And all three of them affords

us the opportunity to explore different career paths while giving us

experiences in three different fields.

the ten-cent tour of a few great positions. 

I’ve worked all three of them, you won’t go wrong with having any one of

them or all 3 of them in your plan.  The

important thing is to have that plan and know what your final Career goals

are!  If I can answer any specific

questions on any of their daily task or where they can lead you please don’t

hesitate to send us an email to [email protected] and I’ll reach out to someone

performing the task, we’ll get an experts view and opinions! 

week, welcome to Q2 of 2019, write down 3 things you’d like to accomplish over

the next 13 weeks and reach for those goals!

you haven’t checked us out on Facebook and Twitter, maybe liked and followed

our feeds I’d greatly appreciate it. 

You’ll find us on both using that @whseandops.  Maybe you’d like joing the Warehouse

Equipment Operators Community group on Facebook as well? 

Have a Prosperous and Productive week ahead and Please

remember our first task is and should always be Doing it Safely at all times!