Serial number & Batch number Traceability

Why use this feature?

Traceability lets you track stock at a level finer than "how many do I have." Instead of just knowing you have 200 widgets, you know that unit SN‑26‑00142 was produced on a specific Manufacturing Order, lives in a specific location, was reserved for a specific customer's sale order, and shipped on a specific date. If it ever comes back as a return, the same identity follows it.

Two flavors are supported:

Serial numbers — one unique identifier per individual unit (good for high‑value goods, electronics, equipment).
Batch / lot numbers — one identifier shared by a group of units produced together (good for food, chemicals, raw materials, anything where you need to recall a batch but not each piece individually).

You don't need to choose globally — you can decide per category or per item.

Turning the feature on

Go to Global Settings → Manufacturing → Serial / Batch Numbers.
Switch on the master toggle. While off, no traceability UI is shown anywhere in the app and no serial numbers are generated, even if individual items have settings saved.
Pick the scope — this controls where the traceability type is configured:
- Item level — set it per item on the item detail page.
- Category level — set it once on the category and every item inherits.
- Global level — set one default for the entire organisation.
Set the default serial number format. The preview shows the next serial that will be generated.

The scope setting is soft: changing it only moves the configuration UI. Any data already saved at another tier is preserved and still respected.

How configuration is resolved (3 tiers)

When the app needs to know "what traceability type does this item use?" it walks three levels, most specific first:

Item config  →  Category config  →  Global config

The first level that has a value wins. So you can set a global default of Batch, override Electronics to Serial, and override one particular Electronics item to None.

The same 3‑tier rule applies to the serial number format string.

Traceability types

None - No serials, no batches. Standard quantity tracking only.Most low‑value, fast‑moving stock.
Serial - Every unit produced gets its own unique serial number. Equipment, electronics, anything you may need to recall or service individually.
Batch - A batch / lot number is entered when production finishes, and all units of that run share it. Food, chemicals, paint, materials — anything traced at the lot level.

Serial number format

Formats are template strings with placeholders:

PlaceholderMeaning{YY}2‑digit year (e.g. 26){YYYY}4‑digit year (e.g. 2026){0000}Zero‑padded sequence number — the length of zeros sets the padding

Examples

GEN-{YY}-{0000} → GEN-26-0142
WIDGET/{YYYY}/{000000} → WIDGET/2026/000142
SN-{0000} → SN-0142 (no year reset)

The sequence increments atomically, so two simultaneous manufacturing completions can never collide. The year is built from the date at the moment of generation; the counter rolls over automatically when the year changes.

When serials are generated

Serial / batch numbers are created at one well‑defined moment: when a Manufacturing Order completes.

If the item is set to Serial, the system generates one serial per completed unit, using the resolved format.
If the item is set to Batch, the completion dialog asks for a batch / lot number. All units from that MO share it. The same batch number can be reused on a later MO — uniqueness is per‑MO, not global.
If the item is set to None, completion behaves exactly as before.

Stock receipts via Purchase Orders, manual adjustments, or imports do not generate serials. Only manufacturing does.

After the MO completes, the app can prompt you to print labels for the generated serials. The label designer supports serialNumber as a bindable field, with extra Manufacturing‑specific fields available too.

The lifecycle of a serial

Each serial moves through a small set of statuses:

   available ──► allocated ──► shipped ──► returned
       │             │
       │  Reserved   │  (release back to available
       │  (soft hold)│   if shipment / SO is cancelled)
       ▼             ▼

Available - In stock, free to be picked. May or may not have a soft link to a sale order.

Reserved - (UI label only) Still available, but earmarked for a customer — appears when a Manufacturing Order that completes is linked to a sale order. Shown as a yellow badge. No shipment has hardened the claim yet.
Allocated - Hard‑claimed by a specific shipment. Physically still in the warehouse.
Shipped - The goods have physically left. This is a one‑way door — a shipped serial cannot be released back to allocated or available.
Returned - Came back from the customer via the return / RMA flow.

How it moves

Available → Reserved — happens automatically when an MO completes and that MO was created from a sale order. The serial gets stamped with the customer and the SO, but the status doesn't change.
Available → Allocated — when a shipment is built. The system can pick the oldest available serials by FIFO automatically, or you can pick specific units by hand in the shipment UI. FIFO prefers serials already reserved for the same sale order.
Allocated → Shipped — when the shipment is marked as shipped.
Allocated → Available (release) — if a single line, an entire shipment, or the whole sale order is cancelled, the relevant serials drop back to available.
Shipped → Returned — via the return / RMA flow.

Where serials show up

Item detail → Serial Numbers tab — every serial for that item, with status, location, batch, sale order, and shipment. Available for both Serial and Batch traceability.
Serial number detail page — open any serial to see its full lifecycle timeline and links to the MO, SO, shipment, customer, and location.
Sale Order detail — a "Serial Numbers" section listing every unit reserved or fulfilled for the order. Serial numbers are included in the SO PDF export.
Shipment detail — the serials that will leave / have left with the shipment, with manual selection while the shipment is editable.
Manufacturing Order detail → Traceability tab — the serials that this MO produced.
Tools → Traceability — a workspace‑wide, filterable, searchable list of every serial, with filters for status, item, location, and a search bar at the top of the table.
Global search — typing a serial string into the top‑bar search finds it directly.

Batch / lot specifics

For Batch items, the only difference at the use level is that completion of a Manufacturing Order asks for a batch / lot number once instead of generating per‑unit serials. The Serial Numbers tab, traceability page, and detail pages all work the same way — they just group by the batch identifier instead of treating each unit separately.

Important rules

Master toggle is the kill‑switch. With Serial/Batch Numbers off, no generation happens, no UI appears, and even items that were previously configured behave as if traceability is None. Switching it back on resurfaces all the saved configs.
Shipped is irreversible. Cancelling a shipment that's already marked as shipped will not release the serials — they remain shipped. Use the return flow instead.
Returns are the only way back. Once a serial has shipped, the only path back into inventory is Returned, which is a distinct status (not the same as available).
Batch numbers don't have to be globally unique — the same batch number can appear on different Manufacturing Orders. They are unique only within a given MO. This matches real production practice where lot codes repeat across runs.
Reservations are soft. A Reserved serial is still available in the warehouse. Stock counts don't change until the serial is allocated (claimed by a shipment) and then shipped.

A typical end‑to‑end example

Acme Widgets category is set to Serial, format ACME-{YY}-{00000}.
Sales creates SO‑248 for 10 widgets for Customer A.
Production creates MO‑117 linked to SO‑248, completes 10 units.
The system generates ACME-26-00001 … ACME-26-00010, all available, each stamped with SO‑248 + Customer A — they show a Reserved badge.
Warehouse builds shipment SH‑902 for SO‑248. FIFO picks those 10 serials → status flips to Allocated.
Driver collects the boxes, the shipment is marked as shipped → status flips to Shipped.
Customer A returns 2 units two months later. Those two go to Returned; the other 8 stay Shipped. The audit trail is complete on every individual serial's detail page.

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