Article #85 How to Delete an Inventory Item in Solid Business Central?

Answer: Keeping inventory records up to date and accurate in Solid Route Accounting™ business systems will increase productivity, reduce search times, and make it easier to print reports and find needed information. Deleting unwanted inventory items is easiest to do if a business is already practicing proper inventory management since, when there's no inventory left to sell, the item's quantity should theoretically be at zero. In many cases though, even if proper inventory management is being used, items will still have quantity on hand in various cost center, which must be settled first before the item can be deleted.

Deleting inventory is often a three step process. The first step is to confirm if there are any quantities for this inventory item remaining in any cost center within the Solid Business Central™business system. Even negative quantities must be settled to zero before the item can be deleted. The second step is that if there are outstanding quantities, inventory counts must be created to set that item's quantity for each cost center to zero. Lastly, the third step is to actually delete the inventory record.

Step 1: Inventory Item Deletion

1. In Solid Business Central™, navigate to [Datafile / Inventory / View] and while viewing the unwanted inventory item, use the use the [Delete] key on the keyboard to display the prompt 'Delete this stock keeping unit / inventory record? [y/N]'. Use the [Y] key on the keyboard to answer yes to this question. The inventory item should now be removed from the list of active inventory.
2. If instead of the deletion prompt, the message shows, 'This item has quantity on hand … you may not delete it,' then those quantities will first have to be completely zeroed out of the Solid Route Accounting™ business system before this item can be deleted, as instructed in Steps 2 & 3 below.

Step 2: Confirm Inventory Quantities

1. In Solid Business Central™, navigate to [Datafile / Inventory / View], and view the inventory item to be deleted.
2. Use the [F3 – CC_Qty] key to display a list of all inventory, with the item highlighted that was being viewed.
3. By using the [TAB] key on the keyboard, a column for each cost center can be seen to the right, such as 'Qty999', which displays what quantities of this item are held in each cost center.
4. Write down the numbers of any cost center whose quantity on hand for this item is greater than or less than zero.

Step 3: Zero Quantity Counts for the Item

The next step, for all cost centers that have an inventory value greater or less than zero for this item, is to zero out that quantity by using Partial Counts. There are three types of cost centers within the Solid Route Accounting™ business system of Mobile, Fixed, and Adjustment. To verify what cost center types are involved, navigate in Solid Business Central™ to [Datafile / Cost Center / View] and look at the cost centers that need this item to be set to zero quantity.

1. A Mobile Cost Center will have the 'Type' field set to M. If possible, use this mobile cost center's handheld computer to create a Partial Count for itself, and set the 'Present Count' for this item to be 0 (zero). Once saved, this count will be applied immediately on the handheld computer's next sync. For more information on creating counts for mobile cost centers, please view Article #84 How to Count Inventory for a Mobile Cost Center.
2. A Fixed Cost Center will have the 'Type' field set to F, with the exception of the administration cost center 999, which is set to Type A. For all Fixed Cost Centers, and any mobile cost center that needs to be counted using a handheld computer other than its own, a Delayed Count for that item must be created with the 'Present Count' set to 0 (zero). Once the Delayed Count is saved and synced back to Solid Business Central™, an administrator can then apply it as a Partial Count. For more information on creating Delayed Counts, please view Article #83 How to Count Inventory for Any Cost Center by using a Delayed Count.
3. An Adjustment Cost Center can be either a 'Type' M or F, but will all have their Adj_To and 'DamagedStk Adj_to' fields set to the same number as is in the Num field. This way, this cost center is set to adjust to itself, which creates an inventory write-off situation. Because changes to cost center quantities made trough inventory counts will go to their Adjustment Cost Centers, these are the last cost center types that should be reconciled. To create a partial write-off for this item, follow the same steps for making a Delayed Count, making sure to set the 'Present Count' for this item to 0 (zero). The only difference is that when saving the count as a Partial Count in Solid Business Central, a prompt will ask to confirm that a write-off via product receipt is to be created. Answer 'Yes' to this prompt to write off this item for this Adjustment Cost Center.
4. Once all inventory counts are completed and applied, this item should now have zero quantity in all cost centers, which can be verified by navigating in Solid Business Central to [Datafile / Inventory / View] and use the [F3 – CC_Qty] key once again to verify the numbers. Once confirmed, go back to 'Step 1' and delete the inventory record.