How to Manage Orders Shipped in Multiple Batches

Suppose your business handles customer orders and shipments. In that case, the typical process is to create an order record when a customer places an order, and then generate a "Delivery Note" when preparing to ship the order. In Ragic, this is usually done with a Convert Records button, which allows you to easily turn an order into a "Delivery Note".

The simplest case is converting one "Sales Order" into one "Delivery Note".

For example, if a customer orders three products (toner, serum, and lotion) and you ship them all at once, the "Delivery Note" will list exactly those three items. In this case, the Convert Records feature is sufficient.

Many businesses ship orders in multiple batches. For example, if the toner is ready but the serum and lotion are not, the customer may request that the toner be shipped first and the serum and lotion later. Or if a customer orders 300 units of toner but only 200 are ready, they may ask to ship those 200 first and the remainder later.

Some companies even plan partial shipments as a regular workflow, such as delivering a quarterly order weekly, resulting in around 12 Delivery Notes per order.

Below are common design suggestions for handling these scenarios in Ragic.

Note: These are typical solutions, not one-size-fits-all. Adjust as needed for your workflow or contact Ragic Support for tailored advice.

If Shipments in Multiple Batches Are Occasional

If most of your orders are shipped in a single batch and only occasionally in multiple batches, the simplest workflow is:

Convert the "Sales Order" to a "Delivery Note" as usual.

On the "Delivery Note", adjust the items or quantities to reflect what was actually shipped.

After processing, note in the order’s "Remarks" field (or as a Comment) that part of the order has been shipped, including the "Delivery Note" link for reference.

This keeps your workflow simple while handling both full shipments and occasional multiple-batch shipments.

If Shipments in Multiple Batches Are Common (or You Want to Build Them into the Sheet)

If shipping in multiple batches is part of your process, or you want to track shipments more systematically, consider the following design suggestions:

1. Multiple Items Shipped in Separate Batches (All Units of Each Item Shipped Together)

For example, if an order contains toner, serum, and lotion, you might ship the toner first, followed by the serum and lotion. If you ship items this way, add a Checkbox field in the "Sales Information" Subtable called "Ship This Time" (you can choose another name if preferred). Then, modify the "Create Delivery Note" button, enable Apply Subtable Filtering Criteria in Advanced Settings, and set the filter to include only the line items where "Ship This Time" is checked.

After setting this up, check the "Ship This Time" box for the items you want to ship, then click the "Create Delivery Note" button. (For subsequent shipments, uncheck and recheck the boxes as needed before clicking the button again.)

The first shipment will look like this:

2. Same Item Shipped in Multiple Batches

If the same item (i.e., a single row in the order Subtable) needs to be shipped in multiple batches, not just different items, adjust your sheet design by adding fields to track "Qty Shipped" and "Qty Remaining" for each order line, ideally with a way to automatically populate or update these values.

You can first add two Numeric fields in "Sales Information": "Qty Shipped" and "Qty Remaining". Apply the Formula = "Order Qty - Qty Shipped" to the "Qty Remaining" field, and set the Default Value of "Qty Shipped" to "0".

The workflow is that when creating a "Delivery Note", you select the items to ship and click the "Create Delivery Note" button. The selected items will be converted to the "Delivery Note", but you will need to adjust the "Qty Shipped", as it may no longer match the ordered quantity.

(If you are concerned that the ordered quantity might be copied to the shipped quantity by default, which could cause errors if forgotten, you can modify the Convert Record button settings to remove the "Order Qty" → "Shipped Qty" mapping and enter the shipped quantity manually. However, converting the order quantity first can help identify any case where the planned shipped quantity exceeds the ordered quantity. You can choose the approach that best fits your needs.)

Since the "Delivery Note" already contains the correct shipped quantities, you can use an Update Value on Another Sheet button to automatically update the order quantities in the "Sales Order" sheet based on the shipped quantities in the "Delivery Note" sheet, eliminating the need to update each item manually.

Note that the Update Value on Another Sheet feature cannot update Subtable fields and can only modify independent fields. Since "Order Qty" is a Subtable field, we first use Create New Sheet from Subtable to generate a separate "Sales Items" sheet.

Then, in the "Delivery Note", go to Design Mode > Form Tools > Update Value on Another Sheet and configure the following settings.

This way, after each shipment, the shipped quantities can be directly updated in the original order.

Note: If your delivery note does not have a "Sales Order #" field, add it and configure the "Create Delivery Note" button to also convert the "Sales Order No."

Optionally, add a "Shipped Complete?" field in the "Sales Order" sheet with a Conditional Formula that returns "Yes" when the sum of "Qty Remaining" in all Subtable items is "0", making it easy to identify completed orders.

This field can also be used for Conditional Formatting or Saving Frequently Used Filters as Views to highlight incomplete orders.

Advanced Settings

View All Shipment Records on an Order

The current design only shows whether items have been shipped and their quantities, not individual shipment details.

To display all related shipments, ensure the "Sales Order #" field exists on the "Delivery Note" sheet and is set as a Linked Field to the "Sales Order" sheet. Then, use Show References From Existing Sheets to add related "Delivery Notes" to the order as a Reference Subtable. Next, generate a new sheet from the "Sales Information" Subtable to create an independent sheet called "Shipped Items". After this step, you can add the "Shipped Items" sheet as a Reference Subtable, which will display the shipment details.

Checking Whether a Specific Item Has Been Shipped in Multiple Partial Shipments (Same Item per Batch)

For multiple items shipped in separate batches (all units of each item shipped together), one approach is to add a Checkbox field to mark items for shipment, then convert them and later check the "Sales Order" to confirm shipment.

If you often forget to click the Convert Record button, add a "Confirmed Shipped" Checkbox field to both the "Sales Order" and "Delivery Note" sheets. Set its default on the "Delivery Note" to "Yes", and use an Update Value on Another Sheet button to update the "Sales Order" automatically after creating the "Delivery Note".

How to Modify the Sales Order Management Template

The "Sales Order Management" template in Install Templates already includes a "Create Delivery Note" button, but it assumes single-batch shipments. To modify it for multiple-batch shipments, you can follow the same steps as described earlier:

Adjust the "Create Delivery Note" button – Apply Subtable Filtering Criteria to convert only the selected items for the current shipment (Alternatively, keep the button as is and manually remove unnecessary items after conversion.)

2. Update the shipment progress:

(1) Add "Qty Shipped" and "Qty Remaining" fields to the "Sales Information" Subtable on the "Sales Order" sheet.

(2) Generate a New Sheet from the "Sales Information" Subtable.

(3) On the "Delivery Note" sheet, create an Update Value on Another Sheet button to update the "Sales Items" sheet, enabling automatic calculation of shipment progress.

The only notable difference in the "Sales Order Management" template is that, to handle products with multiple prices, the "Sales Information" section of the "Sales Order" sheet is linked to the "Pricelist" sheet, so the Subtable displays the "Product Price No." field.

The "Sales Information" Subtable also includes a "Product No." field representing the product. When selecting a "Product Price No.", the system automatically populates this field. It is hidden by default to reduce confusion but can be viewed in Design Mode.

The "Product No." field is also configured to be converted to the "Delivery Note" through the "Create Delivery Note" button. Therefore, when modifying the design, make sure to use this "Product No." field as the reference when updating the "Sales Items" from the "Delivery Note".