Customer Audit

TrackAbout Feature
Feature Name:	Customer Audit
In Module:	Core Tracking
Short Description	This feature is used for visiting a customer's location and performing a physical audit of all assets on site.
Available In:	TAMobile 5, TAMobile 6 Desktop, TAMobile 6 Rugged, TAMobile Android, TAMobile iOS
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Customizing it for You

If you need any of the functionality described under the Customizing it for You section, please contact your TrackAbout Support Team

Overview

Customer Audit allows you to perform a physical audit at a customer location, and reconcile it with that customer's TrackAbout balance.

Why do you need it

This feature gives you the ability to accurately account for assets at customer sites.

How it Works

Performing a Customer Audit at the Customer Site

One or more client employees armed with mobile devices visit a customer location. The employees go room by room, building by building, scanning every asset they can find using the Customer Audit feature. If they find assets that do not have barcodes but which are definitely owned by the distributor, they can perform an Add New action to enter them into the TrackAbout system on the spot. When the employees return to the branch, they sync their scanners. This creates one or more Customer Audit records in the system (and possibly some Add News).

NOTE: TrackAbout Audits are only done at Customer sites. For auditing an internal location see the Internal Inventory Audit page.

To audit assets which are at the customer site:

• Select Customer Audit on the Menu
• Enter the Audit Name. This can be either the Customer’s name or the Customer’s account number.

• Scan the barcodes of all the assets at the customer’s site.
  • For assets that don’t have a barcode, affix the barcode(s) to the asset and hit the Add New button.

• • Choose the Category, Group, Type, and Item# (Product Code) from drop-down lists
  • Select the correct Owner.
  • Tap the Continue button.

• • Scan the Barcode and key in the Serial Number of the asset
  • When done, tap the Save button

• When done scanning all the assets at the customer’s site, tap on the Finish Audit button

• Tap the Yes button on the confirmation screen

Audit Reconciliation on the Trackabout Website

NOTE It is very important that you resolve audits in the same order in which they had been completed.

Here is an example of a specific scenario and how resolving the Audits in the correct order makes a difference:

Prior to the Audit, TrackAbout thinks the asset is at Customer B. Assets are scanned at customer A first, where the asset is found, and then at customer B, where the asset is not found.

CASE 1: Audit records are reconciled in the order in which they happened If the audit for customer A is resolved first, that will create an accounting adjustment, taking the asset off of the balance for customer B. So when the audit for customer B is resolved, the asset is no longer expected to be at Customer B, so the asset does not get marked as Lost. At the end of the day, the asset is at Customer A.

CASE 2: Audit records are not reconciled in the order in which they happened If customer B is reconciled first, the asset gets marked as Lost. When reconciling Customer A, the asset is found, but that record was before the asset was “lost” so at the end of the day, the asset is lost.

Reconciling an Audit

• Ungrouped Audit Records are created by audits being done on handhelds. Then, a website user reconciles the audits. From the TrackAbout Dashboard, click on the Create New Audits link.
  

• You will be walked through the process step by step. The first step is to enter a name for the new audit grouping.
  

• Then put a check mark in the box in front of the Ungrouped Audit Record(s) which should go in this grouping. Click on the Next Page button.
  

NOTE: All audits which are combined in one grouping will be assigned to the same customer account.

• For Select Parent Customer, simply select the customer account number with which this audit should be associated. For help finding that number, click on the Open Customer Search link. Click on the Next Page button.
  

• On the Select Departments page, there will be a summary of the Customers and departments involved in this audit grouping. Make sure there are check marks in front of the customer/department names, and click on the Next Page button.
  

• The Incomplete Audit Summary page will open. It will display several columns: Expected, Found, Difference, Not Found Unique Assets, Surprise Finds.

• • Expected: This column shows how many of each type of asset TrackAbout expected the Customer had prior to the Audit.
  • Found: This column shows how many of each type of asset was actually found during the course of the Audit.
  • Difference: This column shows the difference between how many of each type of asset were expected before the Audit, and how many were actually found during the Audit.
  • Not Found Unique Assets: This column displays how many unique assets were expected at the Customer site, but were not found during the course of the Audit.
  • Surprise Finds: This is the number of assets which were found at the Customer site, but it wasn’t known that this Customer had these assets prior to the Audit.
• Click on Reconcile This Audit to have TrackAbout adjust this customer’s balance. Their balance will be changed to how many assets were found during the Audit.
• This page just suggests that this audit should really be finished all in one process rather than half starting and coming back to it later. Click on the Begin button.
  

• This screen serves as a reminder that all handhelds must be synced before continuing the Audit Resolution. After confirming, click on the Yes button.
  

• The surprise finds page lists barcode numbers that were found on this customer’s balance that were not on it before the audit. Click on the Continue button.
  

• The Not Found Assets page lists assets that were on the balance, but were not found in the audit. In the example below, there is a Not Found industrial argon for this audit (Notice the asset type in the blue bar). This example shows 1 unique non-barcoded assets that was not found during the audit.
  

• There are 3 options for how to handle these not found assets. If there are more than one not found, the same option must be applied to all of the not found. Basically, they must all either be left on the balance or all marked as lost (which takes them off of the balance). Marking a customer as responsible simply means that this asset will appear on the Lost and Found report on the dashboard whenever it turns up. The report will note that the tank was lost when out to this customer. Click the Continue button.
  

• Click the Complete Audit Reconciliation button. TrackAbout will adjust this Customer’s asset balance.
  

Upon successful reconciliation of the audit, a reconciliation report is generated and stored in the system. The customer's balance may have been modified as a result of how the admin decided to reconcile the audit.

Location Audit

You can perform locations inventory update by following these steps:

1. Using a mobile computer, perform a LOCATE action and start scanning all the cylinders at the location you want to update. While scanning, save every 50 to 100 scans as a precaution. Be sure to sync the mobile computer when done. This process might take a few days, just save and sync frequently.
2. Once all assets have been scanned, remove the stale inventory using X days since last scan. Replace X with the number of days since you started the locate action in the previous steps. Here is a link to the Remove Stale Inventory: Remove Stale Inventory. This will remove almost all assets that you didn't scan and mark them as lost.
3. Your freshly inventoried location is now up to date

Troubleshooting Audits

Problem - An asset that was marked as lost during an audit reconciliation does not show as lost once the reconciliation is completed.

Consider the following scenario:

Start with a brand new customer

1. Deliver asset 111 to the customer of AssetType A
2. The barcode is damaged or falls off while there
3. The asset is returned as a RNS since it couldn't be scanned.

Now when you do the Customer Audit, you won't find 111 on the balance anymore, because it is no longer at the location. When the audit logic tries to reconcile, it sees that there were RNS of that type, so it figures that the missing asset was one of those RNS and just marks it as returned, rather than returning it and marking it as lost.