How consignment works

Consignment means that goods sit in one company's warehouse while another company still owns them. Business Central does not have consignment built in: there is no owner on stock, no consignment document and no way to keep a vendor's goods out of your inventory value. Bitta Consignment adds both directions to Business Central without changing how your sales, purchase and inventory accounting work.

Two directions in one app

Direction	Whose stock	Where it is recorded	Typical business
Vendor consignment	The vendor's, until you sell it or buy it	The Consignment Ledger, never the item ledger	Medical implants, jewelry, auto parts, books, art
Customer consignment	Yours, stored at a customer's site	The normal item ledger, at a location linked to the customer	Hospitals, shops and workshops that use your stock and report what they used

How vendor consignment works

1. Receive. The vendor delivers goods that stay the vendor's property. You post a Consignment Receipt with serial numbers, lots, expiration dates, locations and bins. The stock appears in the Consignment Ledger only. Your inventory quantity, inventory value, planning and general ledger do not change.
2. Hold. Move the stock between locations and bins, adjust it, reclassify it in the Consignment Journal and count it with a Physical Count.
3. Sell. On a normal sales quote or order, choose the consignment purchasing code on the line (CONSIGN by default). The line becomes a drop shipment. The app proposes the vendor, checks that the stock is still available and creates the purchase order for the vendor. When you post the shipment, Business Central buys and sells the unit in one step, and the app writes a Sale entry in the Consignment Ledger.
4. Settle. Pay the vendor for what you sold with standard purchase invoices, and send a consignment statement.
5. Return or buy out. Send unsold stock back with a Return to Vendor document, or buy aged stock into your own inventory with an Ownership Change.

Two ways to hold vendor stock

• Vendor consignment location (the default): the vendor's stock lives only in the Consignment Ledger and is sold through drop shipment with the consignment purchasing code, as described above.
• Warehouse Mode location: the vendor's stock is native inventory at zero value, so warehouse receipts, put-aways, picks, shipments, counts and scanners work for it, and you sell it on ordinary sales lines. The Consignment Ledger still records which vendor owns each unit, and the vendor is paid through an item charge when the stock is sold or bought out. See Warehouse Mode.

Why the accounting stays correct

• Vendor-owned stock never posts an item ledger entry, value entry or G/L entry while you hold it at a vendor consignment location. At a Warehouse Mode location it posts item ledger entries at zero value, so your inventory value and general ledger still do not change.
• At the sale, the drop shipment posts a purchase receipt and a sales shipment together. They net to zero in your inventory, and the sale gets its real cost from the purchase order price.
• The vendor liability arises when you invoice the purchase order, as for any drop shipment.
• There are no interim accounts, zero-cost items or revaluations to reverse later.
• If you want to see the value of vendor stock on hand, turn on Value Vendor Stock in Consignment Setup. The value is informational and never reaches the general ledger.

What makes it safe to sell

• Commitment. A consigned serial number can be on one open sales line only, and a lot or a quantity cannot be promised beyond what the vendor holds. See Commitment explained.
• Tracking. The exact serial or lot you sell is taken from the vendor's stock and carried to the purchase order and the shipment.
• Find entries. Consignment entries appear in Find entries from posted shipments, receipts and invoices, in the serial and lot search and in posting previews. See Find entries and reports.

Customer consignment in short

Your stock at a customer's site is still your inventory, so it stays in the normal item ledger at a location that is linked to the customer. Bitta Consignment adds the site setup, replenishment proposals, usage reports that invoice what the customer used, site counts that invoice or write off shortages, and a customer statement. See Customer consignment.

Your first steps

1. Install the app, run the assisted setup and start the license: Getting started.
2. Give each consignment user a seat: License and seats.
3. Post your first consignment receipt: Receive vendor stock.
4. Sell a unit on a sales order: Sell consigned stock.
5. Pay the vendor for what you sold: Settle with vendors.

For your own stock at customers, continue with Customer consignment.