How an order moves through the warehouse

In short

An Outbound Order is taken in as Received, then moves from status to status until it is Shipped or Cancelled. A held order keeps its status and its stock, and carries on from where it stopped once every hold clears.

Taken in, held or refused

Every order is checked the moment it arrives, whether someone enters it or it comes on an order upload. The check has three outcomes:

• Taken in. The order gets the next ORD number, such as ORD-00000016, and starts Received. Numbers run in one series for your whole team.
• Taken in and held. A problem a correction can fix, such as an unknown SKU or a missing email, holds the order. It keeps its number and waits at Received.
• Refused. A problem no correction can fix turns the order away with every reason, and it gets no number.

An Order Refusal is for a closed client account, a missing Client Order Reference, or a Duplicate Order. It is also for a delivery outside Great Britain, Northern Ireland and the Isle of Man, or no valid lines. One bad line refuses the whole order, so nothing ships with a line missing.

What each status means

The Order Status says how far the work has got. Staff and clients see the same statuses.

Status	What it means
Received	Taken in and being checked. A held order waits here until it can be accepted.
Awaiting Allocation	Accepted, with its Must-Ship-By set, and waiting for stock to be reserved.
Partially Allocated	Some of its stock is reserved, and the rest is awaited.
Allocated	All its stock is reserved.
Released	On a Pick List, with the warehouse floor.
Picking	The first unit has been picked.
Picked	Every line is picked.
In QA	Being checked before packing.
Packing	The packer has opened its first parcel.
Packed	Packed and waiting for its collection.
Shipped	Collected: the carrier collection was closed out. This is final.
Cancelled	Cancelled for good, and its stock given back. This is final.

The diagram leaves out some arrows to stay readable. An order can be cancelled from any status before Shipped.

Holds are not a status

An order can carry several holds at once, each with its own plain reason. Examples are Unknown product, Address problem and Held by staff.

While any hold is open, the order can't take its next step. It keeps its status and any stock reserved for it.

Some holds clear on their own once the problem is fixed, such as by adding a missing product. People place and lift others, such as Held by staff.

When the last hold clears, an order still at Received is accepted at once. Its Must-Ship-By counts from then: see How the Must-Ship-By is worked out.

The staff order screen shows each open hold under the order, with how to fix it: see Why an order is held, and how to fix it. Your clients read the same holds in plain words, without your internal notes.

What can change, and when

• Before release (Received to Allocated): the client or your order office can edit or cancel the order outright. Every check runs again on an edit.
• From Released to Packed: nobody changes the lines. A Warehouse Manager can still cancel it, and your client can ask to hold or cancel it.
• Shipped: nothing changes. The order is final.

The Order Timeline

Every order has an Order Timeline: everything that happened to it, newest first under Orders. It records how the order arrived and who sent it, and each hold raised and cleared. It also records each edit, stock reserved and given back, and every step on the floor.

Staff see who did what, with internal notes marked Internal. Clients see the same story in plain words, with your staff shown as "Your warehouse team".

Find an order

• Go to Orders and search by ORD number, Client Order Reference, parcel name or tracking number.
• Use the search at the top of any screen, by ORD number or Client Order Reference.
• Scan the ORD number on the Rapid Scanner to open its page.

Northern Thread's #NT-50240 came in after the cut-off with the code NTC-TEE-NAVY-M, which matches none of its products. It is ORD-00000005, held as Unknown product at Received until someone corrects the line.