Full Inventory counts are typically completed at the end of the financial year to provide your accountant with an exact value of your inventory.

It includes every item in your store, including your storeroom and we recommend doing this outside of your usual trading hours.

When to do a full inventory count

We recommend completing a full inventory count at the end of your financial year as a minimum. Your accountant may also recommend completing a full inventory count at the mid-financial-year point.

Full inventory counts are also beneficial to complete after busy periods of trading, such as Christmas, Boxing Day, Black Friday, or when selling your business.

Preparing for the count

On the day before, or the day of, your inventory count, depending on how much you're counting, you'll need to prepare your inventory to be counted.

Each store will have a different process for this, but we recommend:

• Check your barcode scanners to make sure they are functioning.
• Tidying all areas you'll be counting, including any items on hold.
• Turning all labels barcode-side out for easy scanning.
• Printing new labels for any products missing labels.

A full inventory count should always be completed when your store is closed to get an accurate representation of your stock levels when no changes are being made to inventory.

Starting an inventory count

When you're ready to start your count, you can either start a scheduled count or start a new count:

1. Navigate to Inventory > Inventory counts and click Add inventory count.

   

2. Set the Start date and Start time for the inventory count (this will default to today's date, and cannot be set in the past).

   

3. Select an Outlet to conduct the inventory count from the drop-down menu. The Count name field automatically populates.

   

4. Select the Full count card.

   

5. Click Start count to start counting.

   

Scheduling counts

With Retail POS inventory counts, you can schedule your counts in advance, allowing you to plan out the year and your team can see what they need to prepare and count.

To schedule a new count:

1. Navigate to Inventory > Inventory counts and click Add inventory count.

   

2. Set the Start date and Start time for the inventory count (this will default to today's date, and cannot be set in the past).

   

3. Select an Outlet to conduct the inventory count from the drop-down menu. The Count name field automatically populates.

   

4. Select the Full count card.

   

5. Click Save and exit to schedule the count, or click Start count to start counting immediately.

   

Starting scheduled counts

1. Navigate to Inventory > Inventory counts.

   

2. Click the Due tab and from the list, select the Name for the scheduled count you want to start.

   

3. After you select the count name, the Edit inventory count page displays. If the date and time are incorrect, Retail POS will update them to today's date.

   

4. Click Start count and the inventory count will begin.

   

You'll see a page with a list of all your items to be counted, and the expected count for those items. You don't need to count the items in the order they display on the page.

Counting items

Once you've started the inventory count, there are multiple ways to record your items. Use one of the following methods.

Scanning barcodes with a barcode scanner

If the device you're using to perform the inventory count (desktop or iPad) has a barcode scanner set up, you can simply scan the items into the inventory count to record them.

With quick-scan mode enabled, you can scan back-to-back barcodes to record one of each.

Quick scan mode

Quick scan mode helps you to rapidly scan each item's barcode in your store to add it to your inventory count. Your scanned item will automatically be counted as soon as you scan the barcode.

Don't enable the Quick scan mode toggle if you'd prefer to use the barcodes to look up the item SKUs and enter the final count number before submitting the inventory count.

Alternatively, you can scan the barcode once (with Quick scan mode deactivated), and manually enter the count of each item.

Scanning barcodes using Retail POS's Scanner app

The Scanner app allows you to create and begin inventory counts. You can also use the device's built-in camera to scan barcodes and record items.

For more information on using the Scanner app for inventory counts, refer to the Performing inventory counts in Lightspeed Scanner.

Manually recording and searching for items

You can perform the count manually:

1. Write the expected count for each product with pen and paper.
2. Search for the item in Retail POS and enter the amount counted in the Quantity field.
3. Click Count when you've completed counting the product.

Manually counting your items increases the risk of error. Ensure that the correct items are listed and the SKU is recorded for each so that when entered, the amount is recorded against the correct items.

Accessing counted items

When an item is counted, it displays at the top of your counted list. If you've reached the expected quantity, it will have a checkmark next to it. The item will then display in Your last counted items on the right-hand side of your screen. The number of items in your uncounted tab will also be reduced.

Your count will automatically be saved and the latest save time will display near the Pause and Review buttons.

Reviewing and submitting an inventory count

Once all your counts are submitted, you'll need to review your counted items.

Click Review to open the review page. The five tabs are:

• Uncounted: This lists all items where the total counted is 0. This includes items with an expected count of 0.
• Unmatched: This lists all items that had a count greater or less than the expected amount. This includes items where you expected a negative amount and counted 0.
• Matched: This lists all items you've counted where the total counted equals the expected amount.
• Excluded: Any items you manually exclude from your count.
• All: All items from each tab combined into one.

Review the items in your count, especially the unmatched and uncounted items. If you have discrepancies, you can:

• Click the checkbox next to an item, and select Exclude items in count from the Choose an action drop-down.

• Click the checkbox next to an item, and select Recount items from the Choose an action drop-down. This will set the count for these items to zero, so you can count the items again.

• Click Continue and count the items again.

If you resume counting, the items will still display the quantity you scanned. Use the Recount items option from the Choose an action dropdown on the Review page to reset the item count to zero. Alternatively, on the count page, you can enter a negative quantity for that item in the quantity field to remove items, or to set the inventory level to zero for an item to start from scratch.

Discarding an inventory count

Sometimes, you may need to stop doing an inventory count that you've started. This may be because you've run out of time to complete it, for example. An inventory count should always be completed in a short period.

To discard an in-progress count:

1. Navigate to Inventory > Inventory counts.
2. Click the inventory count name. 
3. Click Review.
4. Click Discard.

Discarded counts will be displayed on the Canceled tab of the Inventory counts page.

Trading while counting

If you were trading while counting, you'll need to make any final adjustments based on sales or returns made during your count period.

If you sell or return an item after you've counted it, that item will need to be adjusted. For a sale, you'll need to decrease the count quantity by one in your inventory count. For a return, you'll need to increase the quantity by one.

If you sell or return an item before you've counted it, these items will have the correct inventory value but a discrepancy may be displayed on the review page (as the expected count would not have changed.)

Any sales made when you're conducting an inventory count will still be correctly recorded in your sales history.

Completing a count

Once you've reviewed and confirmed your count and you're satisfied that all items are accounted for, click Complete.

Next, you will need to confirm that you are finished with the inventory count. Remember, don't do this until all of your staff have completed and saved the counts on their devices. If you have any uncounted items, we'll alert you, as the inventory count for these items will be set to 0.

When you are sure you are done, click Complete.

Once you've clicked Complete, we'll start processing your count. This can take several minutes to complete, especially if you have many items.

Once it's complete, the results will be displayed on the page.

You'll have three tabs:

• Unmatched.
• Matched.
• All.

These will list your items, the expected amounts, the final counts, the change in units after your count, and any associated costs for that change (for example, if you're one unit short, it will tell you what that costs you).

Scrolling down to the bottom of the list will display your total changes in units and total changes in costs.

You'll see two figures for each of these - the total increases (for items where your count was higher than expected) and total decreases (for items where your count was lower than expected).

Exporting count data

Click the export buttons to get a copy of your results.

There are two options:

• Generate PDF report: This gives you a formatted PDF report, including the expected and final count, change in cost, and total value of each product's inventory after the count for each product. You'll also have a summary with total changes for your whole count.
• Generate CSV report: This gives you a CSV file with a line for each product counted. You'll also have columns for the SKU, supplier code, expected stock and actual quantity, stock count difference, difference cost, and inventory value of each product's inventory after the count. This is typically used for importing into another system or creating your own reports.

Reviewing historical inventory counts

You can view historical counts and export the results at any time. To view historical counts:

1. Navigate to Inventory > Inventory counts.
2. Click the Completed tab.
3. Select the Name of the count you want to review.

You can review the data and generate a PDF or CSV report.

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