Creating a sales forecast

You can set up a new sales forecast, or you can:

• Copy an existing sales forecast.
• Import a sales forecast.

To set up a new sales forecast

Open: Planning > Sales Forecasts > Records > New Sales Forecast.

1. Enter a unique reference.
2. Enter a warehouse.

Note: You cannot change the warehouse when products have been added.

3. Select the forecast year.

Note: You can enter a number of forecasts for the same period.

4. To use your company's financial year, select the Financial check box. To use the calendar year, leave the check box clear.

The Start Date and End Date of the chosen year display automatically.

5. The status defaults to Entered. This means that it has not been processed through MPS Master Production Schedule (MPS). The planning of production (usually end item production), to satisfy current and forecast sales orders. The sum of MPS items must equal the agreed sales and operations plan for the items over each planning period. Planning periods are normally a month or a four week period. Items planned within MPS are exploded by MRP (Materials Requirements Planning) to produce the material and capacity requirements. and MRP Materials Requirements Planning (MRP). MRP recommends purchase orders, transfers and work orders to balance supply and demand..

When you want the item to be processed in MPS, change the status to Released.

Once the item is processed through MRP, the status may change to Part Complete, Complete or Cancelled.

6. Select the product or products that you want to add to the forecast.
• To select individual products, click in the Product Code box and select the product from the drop-down list.
• To select multiple products, click Select Multiple Products and select the range of products from the Select Product window.
7. Enter the total quantity of forecasted sales for the year in the Annual Total box.

Note: If you enter a quantity that does not match with the unit of measure The quantity in which a stock item is measured for purchase, sale or storage., the quantity is automatically adjusted to the nearest appropriate value.

The WK boxes display the annual total quantity divided by 53.

Note: If you are using traceability The option to track materials through the system. This is usually by means of serial or batch numbers on the stock items. and the item is serial number traceable, you cannot enter decimal places.

8. Change any of the weekly totals required.

Note: If you enter a quantity that does not match with the unit of measure, the quantity is automatically adjusted to the nearest appropriate value.

The Annual Total is automatically updated.

9. To save your forecast, click Save.

This calculates the last date in each week as the forecast date.