Stock Control, 1 in stock 15 ordered????

[BigRedKeith]

Hi All,

I know this one has been done to death some what, I have spent the last 4 hours trawling through the previous posts all the way back to May 2005. I know there is a way to use the IsStock bla bla bla condition to warn the customers that you only have 1 bottle of 30 capsules of Cod Liver Oil available, but because its in stock when a customer orders 5 60 and another orders 5 180s and another orders 5 360, none of which are in stock, the order goes through. HOW CAN THIS BE????

I have set up one of each product size as hidden and set the stock control as on in the hidden products. In the main catalog I have 1 of each product, stock control is set of and max order is set to 0 minimum to 1.

I have set the stock level to 1 in a selection of 3 products, each of which has 3 choices displayed as dropdown in the main product. Eg. Cod liver oil 30s 1 in stock, Multivitamins 60s 1 in stock and evening Primrose oil 180s 1 in stock.

I uploaded the site to the server, no issues thankfully, and proceeded to place orders for 5 Cod liver oil 60s which are out of stock but the order went through 5 Multivits 180s, same again and 15 of each Primrose oil again accepted.

Just because I can put a message next to each selection saying out of stock if the customer can order what I haven’t got what good is stock control?

Please tell me I have made a mistake and that this does really work.

Keith

[TraceyHand]

as it stands, in Actinic, main products do NOT obey the minimum or maximum quantity orderable for their associated (hidden) products

If you're using 7.0.7 or 8.5.1 HFUA, there is a patch to "fix" this (and it works too!)

Link to details HERE

[BigRedKeith]

Thanks Tracey, am using 8.5.1.0.0. HFUA is it supposed to work with this, the latest version?

Keith

[TraceyHand]

The patch Bruce posted is the 8.5.1 HFUA version.

[BigRedKeith]

Thanks Tracey, got the patch, got it installed ok, still able to put 15 units of a single product in the shopping basket when only 1 of a different size is in stock. so not only can i over order a single choice but i can over order accross the whole product choice set.

I have the min qty set to 1 and max to 0. i have posted the site on the actinic server, it is possible for someone to take a look at tell me where i am going wrong if i send a snapshot?

Thanks
Keith

EDIT.... having refreshed the site, we now cant order anything with 0 stock level, which is great even choices where there are other choices of the same master that are in stock. but we can still order 15 of an item that only has 1 in stock so not really any progress on the stock management front, Please tell me i am wrong and that this really does work because this is why i dumped ePages, no stock management.

[TraceyHand]

ok..I think it is your set up that isn't quite right
Firstly, ensure that there is NO stock control on the MAIN product. No max/min... no stock control etc

Then, ensure that the MAX qty for each hidden associated product MATCHES it's current stock level.

Actinic doesn't automatically use the stock level as the max qty orderable (don't even get me started on that one!) so as stock is ordered, it won't update the max qty to the current stock level.

You'll need something like the Stock Control Mole from Mole End to do this for you. It automatically updates the max qty to match the new stock levels when orders are placed and then, when uploaded, any choice chosen through the main product will, with the patch applied, not allow over-ordering of any associated product.

I'd just re-look at your set-up first.

Point to note...if stock control is truly critical, then I hate to admit that Actinic may not be the software for you!

[BigRedKeith]

Thanks Tracey, following the info here and in other postings you have made on this subject,which BTW has tought me a great deal about the product, thanks, my setup is exactly as you say it should be.

The only thing i would say is that trying to put a 0 in the minimum qty results in the error message saying must contain a number between 1 .... something high. The max is set to 0 with out of stock items and whatever the stock level is with the other choices. and i am doing a full refresh....watch this space.

Stock control is vital, when the site goes live, sometime this month i was hoping, we will have over 2500 health supplements alone, not to mention the skin creams, shampo, spa and body treatments, teas, fruit drinks and steaps, Candles and fragrences, personal grooming and feng shui products. by this time next year we will be stocking around 12-15k and within 2 years we will be up arond the 18-20k products. So Yes, Its very important which is why Mole End's suggestion that the Enterprise solution may benefit us, it certainly will, but not if they cant get the stock control to work. can you imagine how many people we would need to employ just to keep the min and max numbers up to date on a daily basis with that many products???

[RuralWeb]

There is NO real stock control in V8 unless you are constantly downloading orders and uploading stock levels.

[BigRedKeith]

There is NO real stock control in V8 unless you are constantly downloading orders and uploading stock levels.

I know i am the newbie here but, is this the norm? it dont work but we just accept it. Why havent you all moved on to another product that works as it is advertised to. This really gets my goat, you read all the blurb, spend 45 mins on the phone with somene telling you how fantastic the product is spend 28 days building a really good site, only to find the prime feature, stock control dont work, and whats worse, they knew it when the tried to sell me the dam thing.

CLONK.....in the bin

anyone any suggestions of a product that does actually work?...in the stock control department?
Keith

[TraceyHand]

yeh..sorry. The default settings on my catalogue for min 1, max 0 so by leaving them alone, that's what I get. Actinic will ignore (or should!) whatever you have set here anyway for your main products because it's following the associated products min/max qtys, but for ease of use I always have mine as however the default setup is (as above)

Sorry if that caused confusion.

Accurate, up to date stock control in Actinic is high maintenance stuff and definitely not something you want to be looking into if your uploads take significant lengths of time.

My site downloads and uploads with new stock levels (if they have changed) every 10 minutes...but it doesn't take a mammoth sized store to create an upload time of 10 minutes anyway...you'd be permanently downloading/uploading with no time for anything else.

Just something to think about anyway

[BigRedKeith]

Thanks Tracey, maybe when Jan gets back online i can find out a little more about Enterprise, but as its still in development, its unlikely to help me get my site up this year.

Did i see a post by Gabe somewhere suggesting he handled his stock management outside of Actinic?
Keith

[TraceyHand]

I think you mean post 12 in THIS THREAD

He lost me at the word "sql"...LOL

[BigRedKeith]

I have worked with SQL and MySQL in the past as well as FTP's but i am by no means an expert.

When you say you upload and download about every 10 mins, is that automated and if so, where do you set it up?

[TraceyHand]

I use the MoleEnd stock control mole
I couldn't be without it, in fact!

You can set it to download/upload (if needed) at whatever frequency you like and it can also update the max qty orderable field in line with the stock level to avoid over-ordering

It's a life saver, truly!

[BigRedKeith]

could it work with say, 5,000 products, my uploads take 3 mins at the moment with 650 products if thats any help.
Keith