How Transfer Excess Grace Days Work

Use transfer excess days to limit the quantities of stock being returned from child branches to the parent branch. Grace days provide a buffer so child branches with large quantities of surplus stock can retain some the stock before returning the stock to the parent branch. The transfer days increase the surplus point, so that a larger quantity remains in the branch. Over time, the grace days are reduced, permitting over-stocked branches to gradually send surplus back to the central warehouse.

For example, a child branch has a surplus point of 297 items, due to 260 transfer grace days. If the projected inventory level (PIL) at the child branch is 126 items, this branch is considered to be in surplus. However, if the transfer grace days were eliminated from the calculation, the child branch's surplus point would drop to 26 and the branch would be in surplus by 100 items.

To prevent the normal return transfer program from retrieving the surplus stock, set the transfer grace days to 999 and the system marks the items as reserved and will not suggest a transfer. In essence, this setting disables the return from a child branch to the parent branch even in emergency situations. Use this setting for products or lines that you do not want returned to the parent branch.

Setting the transfer grace days to 999 can also affect order quantities on the Suggested P/O Queue, because the system does not expect a surplus stock marked with a transfer grace days of 999 to be returned to the parent branch. The Suggest PO program runs as if the surplus stock will be returned to the parent branch by normal return transfer. When you set the transfer grace days for a product to 999, the program proceeds as if there was no surplus stock item available for return back to the parent branch. The item, therefore, may display on the Suggested P/O Queue for the parent branch to purchase.

Change the transfer excess days using the Default For Excess Grace In Buy Line Maint control maintenance record. You can specify the transfer grace days at the buy line or system level.