Summary
The DCL Logistics team regularly makes updates to our proprietary eFactory platform from direct customer feedback and needs. We strive to make this the best fulfillment tool in the industry, so that our customers can get real-time data to help them manage their inventory, make great business decisions, and give their customers the best service possible.
August 5, 2020 we are launching our latest series of new features and enhancements. The updates are:
Improved navigation: as with every update, we have made slight modifications to the interface in order to give the platform greater efficiency and usability. You’ll see more order information in the Overview dashboard as well as hyperlinks to your orders and inventory in the Items tab.
Enhanced analytics: you’ll see more reports within the Analytics tab to enable more comprehensive tracking, historical comparison, and overall more robust view of inventory.
Delivery status: we have enhanced order information by including delivery dates, delivery status, and deep links to the carrier website on an order basis within the Order section.
Inventory flexibility: we made improvements to give you more control and visibility of your inventory. You can now cancel or edit the expected arrival date of PO Notifications (ASNs) and monitor current and completed Work Orders.
Bundling: through eFactory customers can now create component bundles which will make it easier to create kits or assembled items.
All of the updates are detailed below in order that they appear in eFactory.
I. IMPROVED NAVIGATION
eFactory is organized to provide DCL customers support for the services that we provide. There are a few updates to the Overview, Orders and Items tabs that we hope will enhance eFactory’s efficiency and usability.
New Feature: More Order Metrics
The Overview tab is intended to be a highly customizable dashboard; we envision it to be the nerve center of your fulfillment management systems. The total number of open units and shipped units are now added to the Overview dashboard, to accompany all order information.
Capabilities:
Easily see all details of order information (down to units) in the overview dashboard, limiting the amount of toggling between tabs within eFactory to understand orders.
You will have a more efficient way of seeing revenue from order information.
You can more quickly see if you are nearing an order number or unit number target.
Easily see which orders are getting shipped priority or otherwise.
The information is hyperlinked to quickly show you the detailed information on any order.
New Feature: Multiple Order Filters
The Order tab has more robust information added to enable more efficient order management. Under Orders, now there are added filter options to see order data from multiple accounts or select specific channels to sort orders. The bill of lading (BOL) are also now available in eFactory, they will be scanned and in the system for better tracking capabilities.
Capabilities:
Ability to select multiple accounts or select specific channels to sort orders.
Data can be sorted by warehouse and account as an enhancement of specificity when tracking orders.
Check in on any BOL once this capability is set up in your account.
New Feature: Hyperlinked Inventory Data
On the Items screen, click to easily see the status of inventory for any part number (holds, etc), instead of just the net available.
Capabilities:
View holds in the same place you check inventory details for a smoother, more intuitive way to get details on any single order or item.
Convenient application for efficiently tracking down order or item information.
Spend less time in the data to figure out your inventory levels and part information.
New Feature: Item Enhancements
In order to have greater inventory flexibility, we have made a few key updates to the Items tab. You can now edit PO Notifications, see all stages of work orders, including current and completed, and the applications “Received” and “To Be Received” have now been merged for more dexterity.
Capabilities:
Ability to edit the expected date or cancel PO Notifications (ASNs).
Easily monitor current and completed Work Orders.
Track and compare how many work orders were done in a year or any given period of time.
II. DELIVERY STATUS
New Feature: Delivery Status Notification
Find more information on real-time delivery status, including delivery dates, delivery status, and deep links to the carrier website per order.
Capabilities:
Delivery status information will be added everyday from carriers we have a direct relationship with.
Status will be updated at the end of each day based on the carrier information.
The information shows up in Shipped, Order Lines, Ship Detail, Freight, Package, and Serial Number
III. ENHANCED ANALYTICS
All of the reports in eFactory allow for visualization of inventory and shipping data. We’ve added more dimensions and property values to the report section enabling a greater level of detail. These few features will allow much more granular data mining.
New Feature: Five New Reports
The five additional reports sort information by time, item, channel, customer, and ship method, and within each of those reports you can then drill down into your data further by account, warehouse, destination, channel, country, state, or customer. These additional customizable filters enable you to generate reports with multiple dimensions of data.
Capabilities:
These analytics create an easy way to visualize multiple types of data quickly.
Compare each report to the previous two years to identify trends and growth.
Customizable filters make new data available at your fingertips.
View regional data by state or country to see where your buyers at certain times of year are concentrated.
Look into unit volume by time to make historical comparisons and plan inventory strategy.
Use channel trends (such as REST, EDI, orderpoints, etc) to report on sales by channels to help with channel strategies.
Search trends by region (country and state) to help forecast by region and steer sales efforts to growing marketings.
Look into customer metrics to identify your top customers and their buying habits.
View ship service data to inform your shipping strategies and identify ways to save money.
IV. BUNDLING
Many companies create kits or bundles of items for their consumers to purchase in kits. We’ve added the capability in eFactory to name these clusters of items (or components) with one single bundle number.
New Feature: Bundles
DCL customers now have the ability to designate groupings of items and components within their inventory that can be bundled together as a single package or line on an order. Sending just the bundle number on an order line to the warehouse will signify that those specific components should be picked and packed, or even assembled together for that particular order.
There are three different bundle types that we can now support in eFactory.
Bundled—When a customer wants their consumers to buy one or more specific items as part of a bundle, or kit. Customers will need to work with their account manager to initially set up the bundle item part number, like all other item numbers, but once set up, they will have the ability to add or edit its components directly in eFactory. Upon receipt of an order with a bundled item number, the system will automatically add an order line for each of the components and process the order accordingly.
Configured—When a customer wants to give their consumer the options to decide which of a set of items they want to add in any permutation to their order. Customers will need to work with their account manager to initially setup the bundle item part number only and not need to setup or predetermine the component part number as these can vary per order. This allows the consumers to choose the variations they want in their package, and still ship the associated items as a bundle. In this case the configured item and its components need to be sent to DCL as associated order lines.
Assemble to Order—When a customer wants an item to be shipped with two or more specific components. This will operate similarly to short-run assembly. The item and designated components will need to be assembled. While the assembled bundle is similar to the bundled type on the surface, it is a more involved process as it requires true assembly, similar to a work order, whereby it is not a simple pick and pack fulfillment of an order. Typically, it involves retail box kitting or building one finished product from a number of different components. For that reason, it requires some planning and discussion before this type can be turned on in the fulfillment center. Please reach out to your account manager to learn more.
Capabilities:
This enhancement allows customers greater flexibility in their order management.
Customers can work with their account managers to build bundles in the DCL system ahead of when they want to sell them.
Option to fold the bundle up if you want it to expire or be done.
Customize the bundles easily within eFactory.
Each bundled order will ship in full (if all components are available in stock) eFactory will display the data of how many bundles are available per inventory levels of all items.
See clearly your inventory status through hyperlinked bundle numbers that detail the component list and component items.
The packing slip can be customized to either print the bundled part number, the component part numbers or both.
For the bundled and assembled to order types, the bundled part number only is sent back in the order confirmation.
For the configured type, the bundled part number and the component part numbers are sent back in the order confirmation.
If you have questions about eFactory, it’s capabilities or functions, please contact your Account Manager. We are always seeking feedback for the next feature updates. If there are improvements we can make please let us know!