Ordering MBS ARC Training Manual This chapter focuses on creating purchase orders through the Ordering > Maintain Purchase Orders menu. The Want List chapter will focus on creating orders for wholesalers, however those orders also can be worked with in the Maintain Purchase Order menu. This chapter will also review how to electronically transmit want lists and purchase orders to vendors. This manual covers the following aspects of textbook ordering: Two Types of Textbook Orders in ARC... 2 Review Buying Decisions on the Open-to-Buy Report... 3 Create Purchase Orders... 6 Automatically Create Purchase Orders... 6 Print Purchase Orders... 15 Purchase Order Report and Forms... 15 Manually Create Purchase Order... 18 Transmit Electronic Purchase Orders... 22 Transmission Errors via Pubnet or EasyLink... 24 Delete the Entire Purchase Order... 25 ARC Ordering Checklist... 26
Two Types of Textbook Orders in ARC 1. Wholesale orders. These are placed to wholesale companies such as MBS. The wholesale order goal is to order used and discounted textbooks before publisher orders are placed. Wholesale orders are created using a Want List. More information regarding Want Lists is available in the Want List chapter 2. Publisher orders. These are placed directly to publishers or distributors for new textbooks, and the orders are created from the Purchase Order menu. They can be created for all publishers or for groups. Increasing costs for textbooks often result in wholesale ordering to be viewed as the first step in the ordering process. Acquiring textbooks for discounts, often around 50% off for used or 30% off for new, allow stores to save money on the purchases and pass that savings on to their students. In addition to wholesale orders, acquiring books from students during buyback provides the option to acquire the book directly without receiving, shipping costs, and other considerations. Buyback also helps to increase customer retention by allowing students to be the sellers. Publisher orders are often the most convenient way to acquire customized titles, books with access codes, and other new inventory items. Publishers will occasionally offer discounts, but these are often less than the discounts offered from a wholesaler. Immediate publisher orders often take place around the same time as wholesale orders. Bulk publisher orders often are created around when Want List reworks end, closer to Rush. The Open-to-Buy for a textbook is used to determine the order quantities when placing Want Lists and Publisher Orders. Ensuring accurate Buying Decisions prior to ordering helps create an efficient Open-to-Buy. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 2 OF 26
Review Buying Decisions on the Open-to-Buy Report Creating accurate open-to-buy amounts relies on reviewing buying decisions. To make more accurate decisions, print an Open-to-Buy (OTB) Report and verify order quantities before beginning the ordering process. Processes for setting Open-to-Buy are explained in the Buying Decisions Chapter. The Open-to-Buy Report displays all titles to be purchased for the bookstore. This report helps ensure accurate ordering. Print the report and verify quantities before continuing the ordering process. Reports Menu > Enter Report Requests 1. Highlight Buyer Reports and click Select Individual Reports. Select Group allows for the printing of more than one report at a time. 2. Highlight the Open-to-Buy report and click Select. Choose the desired store and term and click Save. Click Confirm Request. 3. More options are shown. Select report options, and click Save to complete the report generation. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 3 OF 26
This is a listing of textbooks with an Open-to-Buy quantity. Also shown is a summary of the vendors return policies to help determine the precision needed in ordering. Calculations of Open-to-Buy quantities are shown on the Order Quantity Screen. This book screen is accessible through a variety of menu options such as Maintain Adoptions, Maintain Book Information, and Work with Textbooks. On the Order Quantity Edit screen that follows, the Open-to-Buy calculation is shown. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 4 OF 26
In this case, estimated sales are 85 textbooks. The estimate includes 5 reserved books and 20 Buyback books. Estimated units are subtracted, leaving an Open-to-Buy quantity of 60 titles. Buyback Estimated is used to provide the system with the best estimate for the number of books students will sell. This action does affect Open-to- Buy. Budgeted and Speculative units amount to the number of books that can be bought by the system, and these fields do not affect Open-to-Buy. This number may amount to more units than Buyback Estimated. However, the combined amount of Budgeted and Speculative should never be less than the amount Estimated. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 5 OF 26
Create Purchase Orders Ordering flexibility in ARC is provided with automatically generated and manually created purchased order processes. The automatic generation process saves data entry time for situations that require multiple titles and/or multiple publishers ordering. Manual creation of purchase orders may be more efficient in situations that require only a handful of titles from one or two publishers. Automatically Create Purchase Orders Ordering > Maintain Purchase Orders 1. To create a purchase order, click Add PO. 2. The PO Creation Method defaults to Automatic. Click Save. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 6 OF 26
Defaults for these options can be set by your client representative, and you can set them on this screen for each individual order. It is possible to override the defaults for this specific generate batch only. Click Save to use the listed defaults and to move on the next screen. Select Immediate Order Books Only? Yes will load purchase orders for only those books marked as Order ASAP from Publisher? on the book s Order Quantity screen. Add Withhold from Order Quantities to Open to Buy Figures? Yes overrides any quantities that were withheld from the original Open-to-Buy calculation, and it adds those quantities to the total order amount. Since Withhold from Order is often used for estimating Rental Returns and other purposeful reductions to Open-to- Buy, this is not recommended. Zero Withhold from Order Quantities After PO Creation? When the PO is sent, Yes will decrease to zero any quantity in Withhold from Order on the Order Quantity Edit screen of books ordered. This is also not recommended unless adding Withhold from Order to the order. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 7 OF 26
List Books Still Requiring an Order? If Yes, a report of all titles that were not placed on a PO during this automatic generation will print. Create Purchase Orders Under Minimum? This gives you the option of overriding the order quantity or amount minimum set in Maintenance > Maintain Vendor Information > Other Data > Ordering Info. Send Pubnet Vendors Via Pubnet? Pubnet is a 3 rd party electronic order submission system that is integrated with the MBS System. Select Yes if your vendor uses this service and you want to submit your PO via Pubnet. Send EasyLink Vendors Via EasyLink? EasyLink is a 3 rd party electronic order submission system that is integrated with the MBS System. While typically used for wholesale orders, some publishers also can use this service. Select Yes if your vendor uses this service and you want to submit your PO via EasyLink. Pubnet Ship Code? Ship Best Method is the typical selection, but that can be changed to another code listed in the drop-down. Send all other orders via? This field is used to indicate how all orders not being sent via Pubnet will be transmitted. FOB Point? Free on Board set to Destination seeks to apply responsibility of the shipment on the shipper/vendor until the shipment is delivered. Shipping Point refers to the bookstore having responsibility for the shipment while in transit (either after leaving the vendor or a specified point along the shipping route). 3. Complete selecting options, and click Save. The screen that appears has options relevant to Pubnet (pubnet.org). If not using Pubnet, Save to continue past this screen. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 8 OF 26
Earliest Ship Date Enter the earliest date Pubnet vendors should begin sending the orders. Special Offer Code Enter any code the vendor has for a certain discount. Delayed Billing? This is used if an agreement exists between your store and the vendor to defer billing. Delayed Billing Month Enter the month number if billing is to be delayed. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 9 OF 26
Back Order Code? These define how to manage backorders (items temporarily out of stock). o Back Order Only NYP (not yet printed) means to only backorder titles pending print. o No Back Order means do not backorder any items. o Back Order All means put items on a backorder regardless of reason. o Back Order Only OS means only backorder items out of stock. Cancel Date Enter the date by which the order should be canceled if backorders cannot be filled. Special Shipping Service? Enter any shipping requirements (UPS only, no weekend delivery, etc.). Exception Instructions Enter any additional notes and considerations to be sent via Pubnet. 4. Complete selecting options, and click Save. Your chosen options for automatic generation are shown. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 10 OF 26
Additional Options include: Generate POs Completes the automatic PO creation. This should be the last step completed on this screen. Pubnet Defaults Reviews the previous Pubnet selections screen for Pubnet orders. Select Pubs/Groups Allows selection of specific vendors or vendor groups to be added to this order. 5. If selecting specific publishers or groups, click the Select Pubs/Groups additional option. If generating all POs, navigate to step 11. 6. Select the Additional Option to Select Pubs or Select Groups. The following example selects publishers, but both methods are entered the same. 7. The example shows additions by publisher. Click Add Vendor to search for a publisher to add, then highlight and click the option to Select. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 11 OF 26
8. Continue as needed. Alternative, the Option to Specify Range can be used to select a starting and ending Publisher. 9. Once the list is entered, click Confirm Selection. 10. Save to continue back to the review of the Automatic Generation or Update to add more vendors. The Change Equality option allows the selection to be Equal to (default) or not Equal to the selected values. 11. If not selecting specific pubs/groups, or once those selections have been made, complete the purchase order automation by clicking Generate POs. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 12 OF 26
12. You can enter a PO number or let the system assign the next number. Mark Yes to send the POs to the document center as soon as they are posted. Click Save. 13. PO s are sent to document center (if you chose that option), and they are now created and display in Maintain Purchase Orders. Additional summary review can be seen at this step regarding the autogeneration. Clicking Show Generated lists PO s that were automatically generated: the creation date, the finalization status (Yes=finalized, No=in process), the number of errors in the PO, and if the PO order quantity or amount is under the minimums set in the Maintenance menu. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 13 OF 26
14. Display Generation Options shows the options you chose earlier in the ordering process. Highlighting a batch line and clicking Display Errors can help fix errors. 15. Highlighting the order with an error and clicking Display Detail will show the book with the error (in this case, an ISBN error). This error can be corrected at Adoptions > Maintain Book Information. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 14 OF 26
To view these details again at a later time, the Additional Option in Maintain Purchase Orders for Auto-Gen History will display the generations and provide the options to review them. Print Purchase Orders Ordering > Maintain Purchase Orders 1. Highlight a purchase order and click Select. This places an asterisk next to the PO. 2. With the purchase orders selected, click the Print Selections option. The printout will appear in My Documents. Purchase Order Report and Forms When printing purchase orders through the automatic generation, two reports print. The first is a summary of what was generated the purchase order creation, and the second is a report version of the purchase orders that were created. A third report will also print for the list of books still requiring an order if that option was selected during generation. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 15 OF 26
Examples of these reports are as follows. Books Still Requiring an Order Purchase Order Generation Rpt MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 16 OF 26
Purchase Orders: Report Format The Purchase Order report format will contain a page break for each new vendor purchase order. A purchase order form is also available to print. This only is available if a purchase order is printed from the Maintain Purchase Order menu after it has been created. The form is designed to submit to a vendor, and an image for the store can also be added to it if needed. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 17 OF 26
Manually Create Purchase Order Ordering > Maintain Purchase Orders 1. To create a purchase order, click Add PO. 2. Select Manual and click Save. Choose the vendor, and click Save. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 18 OF 26
PO must be prepaid? Check Yes if the PO has to be paid before the textbooks are received. This is often defaulted to No as pre-pay will ask for a check number during receiving. Accounts Payable can select vendors for pre-pay when working directly with the invoice. Vendor to Pay Enter a separate vendor to receive payment (a credit card vendor can also be used, but it must be set up in the vendor file). Send Via? Chose how to send the PO. EasyLink sends POs to wholesalers who subscribe electronically (and some select publisher), and Pubnet does the same to publishers. These are both 3 rd party services that must be purchased outside of. The other options are informational only and will print on the PO. Terms Code This code is set in Maintenance > Maintain Purchase Order Terms. The terms code refers to the publisher s default payment time frame (net 30 for example). Ship Date Select the date for when the order should be shipped. Pubnet Code Ship Best Method is the typical selection, but that can be changed. If using Pubnet, code 401 is Ship Best Method. If you have no shipping preferences, or if you are not using Pubnet, leave this box blank. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 19 OF 26
Ship all other orders via If left blank, vendors may ship by whichever method they want. Otherwise, select a shipping method. FOB Point? Free on Board set to Destination seeks to apply responsibility on the shipper/vendor until the shipment is delivered. Shipping Point refers to the bookstore having responsibility for the shipment while in transit (either after leaving the vendor or at a specified point along the shipping route). 3. Click Save. A message states The PO was created. Continue. Click Save. The PO header is now created and you will be returned to the main menu for Maintain Purchase Orders. The next steps review adding books to the purchase order header. 1. Return to Ordering>Maintain Purchase Orders, highlight the PO header you created, and click Book List. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 20 OF 26
2. Click Add Book. Find the book to order from this publisher. The following ordering screen appears. 3. Enter the quantity desired, and click Save. Open-to-Buy displays on the right side of the screen. The Open-to-Buy report is useful in developing orders, and the Order Quantity Edit screen (available on book information screens) shows detailed data on the open to buy quantity. Clicking Save again brings up a screen to add more books to the PO. Returning to Ordering>Maintain Purchase Orders, the PO can be printed ( Print Purchase Order ) or sent electronically ( Prepare Transmit ). MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 21 OF 26
Transmit Electronic Purchase Orders Once purchase orders are created, stores can electronically transmit purchase orders to Pubnet and EasyLink vendors. To use Pubnet or EasyLink the store must subscribe to that service outside of the MBS System. Additional options may need to be set (for instance, the SAN for Pubnet vendors in the vendor file) prior to using this service for the first time. Contact your MBS Client Representative if starting these services for the first time to ensure set-up is complete. To transmit purchase orders electronically, use the following steps: Ordering>Maintain Purchase Orders 1. Highlight the purchase order to transmit electronically (via EasyLink or Pubnet), and click Prepare Transmit. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 22 OF 26
2. Select the appropriate electronic transmission service. Options include: EasyLink to transmit purchase orders using the EasyLink communication service. Pubnet to transmit purchase orders using the Pubnet communication service. 3. Select the transmission method and click Save. Displayed is the current PO (in this case, #2104) along with any others that have not been sent. Hold Select this to exclude a purchase order from transmission. Release Select this to include a purchase order that were marked Held in the transmission batch. Hold All Select this to exclude all purchase orders from transmission. Release All Select this to include all purchase orders that were marked Held in the transmission batch. Generate Select this to transmit the PO/PO s. 4. Click Generate to complete the electronic submission. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 23 OF 26
Transmission Errors via Pubnet or EasyLink Follow these steps if there is an error when transmitting purchase orders via Pubnet or EasyLink (Maintain Purchase Orders). 1. Click Error Recovery. Any electronic transmissions that failed will be listed in the Transmissions in Error Recovery table on this screen. Try Again Select this to resubmit a batch of transmissions listed in the table. Display Purchase Orders Select this to display the purchase orders in a transmission batch. Delete Select this to delete the entire batch. 2. Sometimes a batch can get stuck transmitting. To view any batches that might be stuck, click Show Active Requests. The same three options (Try Again, Display POs, and Delete) appear in the Active Transmissions table. Deleting titles off a PO or deleting an entire PO will update the Open-to-Buy for those titles back to what they were prior to placing the order. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 24 OF 26
Delete the Entire Purchase Order Ordering > Maintain Purchase Orders 1. Highlight the purchase order and click Delete. (Purchase orders can only be deleted if the store has not received any titles on the purchase order.) 2. Click Confirm to delete the PO. MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 25 OF 26
ARC Ordering Checklist Print Open-To-Buy Report and Review Buying Decisions Create Want lists (Automatically or Manually) Edit/Print Want lists Transmit Electronic Want lists Receive Want list Responses & Create Purchase Orders Create Publisher Purchase Orders (Automatically or Manually) Edit/Print Purchase Orders Transmit Electronic Purchase Orders MBS TEXTBOOK EXCHANGE, LLC PAGE 26 OF 26