Picking waves

A picking wave is one trip through the warehouse serving several orders at once. Instead of a separate trip for each order, the operator receives a single route.

Where it starts

From the Shopware order list: Orders → Orders.

• Quick pick — plan a wave plans a wave automatically: the module selects the orders that can be collected at this moment.
• Create packing operation on selected orders creates an operation for exactly those orders. With several warehouses the module asks for the target in the Choose target warehouse dialogue.

Note

If the warehouse has not been set up yet, the module does not allow a wave to be planned and offers to run the wizard. Without a linked catalogue every line would be reported as “not in stock”, so the list would carry no usable information.

Tip

With a matching automatic printing rule, the pick list is sent to the printer the moment the wave is planned, before the operator has seen it on screen, so the printout is ready by the time the operator reaches the printer. Orders added to a wave already under way are printed the same way.

Which orders go first

Among the orders a wave can take, four keys are applied in turn. The priority rules decide first, so that a deadline cannot quietly reverse what a rule was set up to do. Within one rank the time of the next collection decides, then the delivery date recorded on the order, and finally its age. → Priority rules · Collection times

An order for which nothing was configured sorts behind the orders that carry a value: a missing collection time is not the same as a collection at midnight, and an order nobody promised anything about does not overtake one that was promised. On the last key the direction follows the queue setting, which is oldest first out of the box.

The order of the lines inside the wave, which is the route itself, is a separate question. → The picking route

What a wave leaves out and why

Planning reports what it did not take:

• orders held by another wave — somebody is already picking them,
• orders with no cover in this warehouse — they stay queued until goods arrive,
• orders belonging to another building — they are picked there,
• oversized orders — to be handled manually,
• orders containing only articles excluded from picking,
• orders that did not fit on the picking cart — they wait for the next wave.

These are decisions, not errors, and for that reason they are listed explicitly.

Orders without goods

If the selection contains orders with no cover, the module asks how to handle them:

• Pick what is available — collect what can be collected,
• Pick everything anyway — take everything, including lines with no stock,
• Put aside and stop asking — move them into a waiting state; they return automatically once the goods arrive.

Caution

Putting orders aside works only for orders that have a way back out of that state. Orders with no return path are not moved. The module lists them by name instead of placing them in a state they cannot leave.

One wave at a time

While a wave is open, no new work is planned; the module offers to reopen it (Reopen). This also applies to a wave opened by somebody else, in which case the module states who owns it.

The limit is deliberate: two parallel waves on the same stock would send two operators for the same unit.

Two stations planning at once

A wave claims its orders at planning time. If another station was quicker, the module reports how many orders it actually managed to take, instead of planning work that is no longer available.

Next step

A planned wave opens the picking screen. → Picking in practice