Allied Hygiene is a British manufacturer and international distributor of industrial wipe products. Upon upgrading their ERP to NetSuite, a mobile barcoding solution was an essential next-step to get their stock under control.
“For many years, we were doing quarterly stock takes because the stock was so badly out,” said Matthew Clubley, IT Manager at Allied Hygiene. Even after migrating their warehouse operations from 10 locations to one, it proved impossible to maintain an accurate count of their inventory due to their manual paper-based method. Picking was a nightmare for staff, who spent long periods searching for items that often weren’t even there. Sales orders were difficult to fulfill without knowing exactly what was on hand, and stock counts were lengthy exercises prone to errors, which often took weeks to iron out.
Wiping the Slate Clean
After a positive recommendation from their NetSuite implementation partner, Allied Hygiene decided to
proceed with RF SMART. “It covered all of the bases almost immediately for us,” said Matt. They began by deploying functions such as sales order picking, goods receiving, item enquiry and bin transfers to quickly tighten up their inventory control.
Less errors, coupled with real-time data, meant a rapid improvement in accuracy and efficiency for their
operations. “Now, if a customer rings and asks for an estimate on when they’re getting their order, sales admins can look at their screen and see if it’s picked and packed already,” Matt said. “The benefit of live feedback is excellent.”
Improving their counting process was the next high priority issue to tackle. “During a stock take, we used to come in over the weekends. It would take all the office staff to manually enter in what the guys had written on a bit of paper, and half the time you’d get errors,” Matt explained. By implementing cycle counting, the business has managed to increase their accuracy from 75% to 99.6% and can now conduct counts less frequently.
They can also perform rolling stock takes and count designated areas at a time without having to halt receiving and dispatching goods, and with less people. “Tightening the control and using scanners with RF-SMART has pulled our stock up sharp,” Matt said. “If it did nothing else but save us money on the stock takes, RF-SMART has paid for itself. Everything else is a bonus.”
A Mobile Solution for Manufacturing
Allied Hygiene has also implemented RF-SMART in the chemical area of their manufacturing department. By using mobile work order functions, the production process has become less susceptible to human errors, and the staff has instant visibility of stock levels, work order stages and task statuses.
The user-friendly interface has been a big hit with the manufacturing team, who adapted to using the new scanners very quickly. “It’s so straight forward because it gives them just what they need,” said Matt. Thanks to an efficient implementation and training process, staff were confident in using the new technology quickly.
The business is currently in the process of rolling out RF-SMART across other areas of their manufacturing operation. Allied Hygiene is extremely satisfied with the results they’ve achieved so far and has already recommended RF-SMART to other businesses in the EMEA region.