Lot Freshness

When dealing with certain products, such as perishables, it may be necessary to specify the period of time for which an item is of the highest quality. This period is typically indicated by what is known as a best if used by or sell by date, and should not be confused with an expiration date, which specifies the date at which the item becomes unsafe for use. For example, a baked good that is consumed a day or so after its sell by date is still safe to eat, although it may be of a lesser quality. Once the item's expiration date has passed, however, it is considered to be inedible, and consumption may lead to negative effects.

You can instruct the program to calculate lot freshness information for lot tracked items. Depending on the method by which lot freshness is calculated, the system may enter a lot freshness date on new lot number information records. In addition, when you set up lot preferences for customers, you can specify preferences for lot freshness values.

You indicate the manner in which an item's lot freshness preferences are specified in the Freshness Calculation Method field on the Item Tracking FastTab on the item card. Regardless of the selected method, lot freshness is always calculated from the lot record's production date. The manner in which an item lot's production date is specified depends on the type of transaction through which the item entered the inventory. If the item lot record was generated as the result of production output, the production date is automatically assigned from the related output journal line's posting date. For all other transaction types, such as purchases and positive journal entries, the production date must be manually entered by the user.

There are two methods by which an item's lot freshness is calculated:

• Days To Fresh - lot freshness is determined according to a days to fresh value that is specified in the Lot Freshness table, which is used to record customer lot freshness preferences. Selecting this option instructs the program that lot freshness does not need to be recorded for item lots, but that the age of the lot must still be maintained for the purpose of meeting customer lot freshness preferences.
• Best If Used By/Sell By - although these are presented as two separate calculation methods, they both determine lot freshness according to a shelf life calculation formula that is defined for the item. This formula is applied to the item lot's production date to calculate the freshness date. For example, if an item has a shelf life calculation formula of 7D, the program interprets this as 7 days. When a lot record for that item is created with a production date of July 15, the program calculates a best if used by or sell by date of July 22. While there is no difference in the manner by which they calculate lot freshness, Best If Used By and Sell By are presented as two separate options because it may be that a company prefers using one term over the other when describing an item lot's shelf life.