Returns

Consignment stock comes back in two ways. Unsold stock that you still hold goes back to the vendor with a Return to Vendor document. A unit you already sold can come back from the customer, and you decide whether it stays in your own inventory or goes back into the vendor's consignment stock.

Return unsold stock to the vendor

You never bought this stock, so the return does not touch your item ledger or the vendor's account. It only removes the stock from the Consignment Ledger.

1. Search for Consignment Returns to Vendor and choose New.
2. Enter the Vendor No. and the Location Code. Enter a Reason Code if you track why stock goes back.
3. Choose Get Consignment Stock, select the stock that goes back and choose OK. The selected serial numbers and lots of one item and bin go on one line, as its item tracking lines; untracked stock gets a line per entry. Choose Item Tracking Lines on a line to see or change its serials and lots.
4. Choose Post. The app writes Return to Vendor entries.
5. Open the posted document in Posted Consignment Documents and choose Print for the Consignment Return Note to send with the goods, or Send to email it to the vendor.

The return note shows the vendor's address, the location the goods leave from, the reason (when the document has one), every line with its quantity and Unit, and signature blocks for the warehouse, the carrier and the vendor. The variant, the serial numbers, lots and packages of the line and the expiration date print on a detail line under each line. Show Bins prints the bin each unit was taken from, and No. of Copies prints extra copies, for example one for the carrier. You can also print it from the open return with Print before you post: it is then marked Not posted. The report uses the usage Consignment Return Note on Report Selection - Purchase.

You can also enter the lines yourself, with the serials and lots on Item Tracking Lines (Select Entries lists the vendor's open stock). A line without Applies-to Entry takes the oldest matching stock with exactly the same vendor, variant, location, bin, serial, lot and package.

Return part now, the rest later

When only part of the stock goes back now, post the return in parts:

1. On the line, lower Qty. to Handle to what goes back now. For a tracked item, open Item Tracking Lines and set Qty. to Handle (Base) on the serial numbers and lots that go now, so their total equals the line's Qty. to Handle.
2. Choose Post. Only that part is returned, on a posted document of its own.
3. The return stays open with the rest: Quantity Handled shows what went back, and Qty. to Handle proposes the rest. Post again later; the last posting deletes the return.

Undo a return

When a return to vendor was posted by mistake, open the posted return in Posted Consignment Documents, select the lines and choose Line > Undo Return to Vendor. The stock comes back into the Consignment Ledger with its original Received Date, a correction line is added under each undone line, and the quantity with its serial numbers and lots goes back to the open return (created again under its number when that posting had completed it). Undo is refused for a line that is already undone, or whose stock was already brought back.

Customer returns to consignment

When a customer returns a unit that you sold from consignment stock, you have two choices:

• Keep it. The unit becomes your own stock, because you bought it from the vendor at the sale. This is a normal sales return.
• Return it to consignment. The unit goes back into the vendor's consignment stock and the vendor credits you for it.

The setup field Return to Consignment in Consignment Setup decides the default:

Value	Effect
Ask	You decide on each return order. A notification offers Return to consignment for the lines that sold consignment stock. This is the default.
Always	Returns of consignment sales always go back to the vendor's stock.
Never	Returns of consignment sales always stay in your own inventory.

Steps

1. Create a sales return order for the customer and choose Get Posted Document Lines to Reverse. Select the line of the original consignment shipment.
2. On the return line, check Return to Consignment, or choose Return to Consignment on the Home tab for every line that sold consignment stock. Consignment Vendor No. shows the vendor whose stock was sold.
3. At a location with Bin Mandatory, check Bin Code on the line. When you choose Return to Consignment, a line without a bin takes the bin the unit was sold from; change it if the unit goes to another bin.
4. Post the return receipt as usual. The unit is received into your own inventory first.
5. When Return to Consignment is selected, the app creates a purchase return order to the vendor for the unit, with the same serial or lot and bin, and shows a notification such as: "Purchase return order 1001 was created for vendor 10000. Post it to return the units to the vendor's consignment stock." Choose Open purchase return order.
6. Post the purchase return order. The unit leaves your inventory, the vendor's credit is recorded when you invoice the return, and the app writes a Customer Return entry that puts the unit back into the vendor's consignment stock with its original received date.

Limits

• A serial number that a customer returned and that you kept in your own inventory cannot be received into consignment again while it is still in your own stock.
• The aging of a unit that returns to consignment continues from its original Received Date; it does not restart.
• At a Warehouse Mode location a customer return is a native sales return at zero value; Return to Consignment is refused there. See Warehouse Mode.
• The vendor's credit for returned units is created on the Consignment Settlement page: Create Settlement Documents credits the listed return shipments of the vendors you settle, and Credit Returns Only in the Return Shipments to Credit part credits returns without invoicing anything. See Settle with vendors.

What's next

Buy aged stock into your own inventory: Buy-out and aging.