RFID tags, and posting a whole delivery in one read

A tag on a pallet can carry an entire goods receipt. How to print one, how to read it on a phone or a laptop, and what happens when you do.

There are two kinds of tag, and the difference is what they are stuck to. A tag on a box names one material and books one line, exactly as a barcode does. A tag on a PALLET names the purchase order the pallet arrived against, and one read of it posts the whole goods receipt.

Printing a delivery tag

1. Open Supply Chain → Purchasing → Purchase Orders and find the order you are expecting.
2. Choose Print a delivery tag from the row. Say which bin the goods will land in — it can still be changed at the dock.
3. A tag is written carrying every line the order still has open, and the sheet that comes back prints the same code as a barcode and a QR. A warehouse with a tag printer encodes the code into the inlay; one without prints the sheet and sticks it on.
4. Asking again gives you the tag the order already carries rather than a second one. Tick Write a new tag only when the first is lost.

Reading a tag

Press RFID — on the applications screen to post a whole delivery, or beside the scan box to book a line. The panel offers whichever ways your device has, and says which one it is using:

• Tap a tag. A phone held against the tag. This needs Chrome on Android; the console asks your consent first, and only the code on the tag is read.
• A reader that types. Almost every desk and handheld reader plugs in and types the code, exactly like a barcode gun. The Tag code box holds the focus, so wave the reader and it is read. This works on any laptop and needs nothing of the browser.
• A tag on file. Choose the tag rather than read it — for a supervisor posting a delivery from a desk, with the paperwork and not the pallet.

What one read does

A goods receipt is opened, every line the tag carries is booked, and the movement is posted — in one step, with the material document number shown at the end. The labels and the material document are offered exactly as they are after a movement posted by hand. If the tag turns out to be on a box rather than a pallet, it is booked as a single line instead, and the console says so.

If the tag will not read

• A tag the console has never seen is refused by its code. Register it under Supply Chain → Warehouse → Goods Movement → RFID Tags, or print a new one from the order.
• Tapping needs NFC switched on in the phone’s own settings as well as allowed for the site.
• You can always type the code printed under the barcode on the tag sheet. That is the same read.