Enable Automatic Breaking Bulk with Directed Put-away and Pick

For locations that use directed put-away and pick, Business Central can, in various situations, automatically breakbulk, that is, break a larger unit of measure into smaller units of measure, when it creates warehouse instructions that fulfill the needs of source documents, production orders, or internal picks and put-aways. To breakbulk sometimes also means gathering smaller units of measure, if necessary, to meet outbound requests by breaking the larger unit of measure on the source document or production order into the smaller units of measure that are available in the warehouse.

Breakbulking in Picks

If you want to store items in several different units of measure and allow them to be automatically combined as needed in the picking process, select the Allow Breakbulk field on the location card.

To fulfill a task, application automatically looks for an item in the same unit of measure. But if it cannot find this form of the item, and this field is selected, application will suggest that you break a larger unit of measure into the unit of measure that is needed.

If the system can only find smaller units of measure, it will suggest that you gather items to fulfill the quantity on the shipment or production order. In effect, it breaks the larger unit of measure on the source document into smaller units for picking.

Breakbulking in Put-aways

In the warehouse put-away, application automatically suggests Place action lines in the put-away unit of measure, for example, pieces, even though the items arrive in a different unit of measure.

Breakbulking in Movements

The application also breakbulks automatically in replenishment movements, if the Allow Breakbulk field is selected on the Option FastTab on the Calculate Bin Replenishment page.

You can view the results of the conversion process from one unit of measure to another as intermediate breakbulk lines in the put-away, pick, or movement instructions.

Note

If you select the Set Breakbulk Filter field on the warehouse instruction header, application will hide the breakbulk lines whenever the larger unit of measure is going to be completely used. For example, if a pallet is 12 pieces and you are going to use all 12 pieces, the pick will then direct you to take 1 pallet and place 12 pieces. However, if you have to pick only 9 pieces, then the breakbulk lines will not be hidden, even if you have selected the Breakbulk Filter field, because you have to place the remaining three pieces somewhere in the warehouse.

Note

If you want your units of measure to perform optimally in the warehouse, also in connection with the breakbulk functionality, you should wherever possible try to:

• Set up the base unit of measure for an item as the smallest unit of measure that you expect to handle in your warehouse processes.
• Set up your alternative units of measure for the item as multiples of the base unit of measure.

See Also

Warehouse Management
Inventory
Setting Up Warehouse Management
Assembly Management
Design Details: Warehouse Management
Working with Business Central