With Pickware, you can record and manage the best before dates (BBD) of your products. This way, you always keep track of remaining shelf life and can manage your stock efficiently.

For BBD to be recorded and managed automatically when you work with Pickware, the tracking profile BBD only or Batch & BBD must be configured for a product. If the tracking profile Batch only is configured for a product, you can maintain a BBD as additional information for the batch. In this case, however, the BBD has no effect on the processes in Pickware.

As soon as a tracking profile that requires a BBD has been configured for a product, the BBD information must be fully recorded for stock movements & shipping.

If you want to record a new BBD, navigate to Warehousing → Batches and BBD and create a new batch. Here you select your product and can enter a BBD. Only products that are tracked by BBD are available for selection.

The required fields you need to fill in, which differ depending on the selected tracking profile, are marked with an asterisk.

You can also create a batch including its BBD directly when recording a goods receipt, without leaving the process. You can find out how this works in the section How do I record BBD?

BBD can be recorded individually per line item when working with WMS and in the Admin when recording a goods receipt or when stocking the goods receipt.

If a product is delivered with multiple BBD in one delivery, you can map these in one goods receipt. To do this, when working in the Admin, record one line item of the product for the goods receipt. After recording the goods receipt, you can split the single line item of the product into multiple line items using the button:

You can then select a different batch for the split part:

If the matching batch is not yet in the system, you don't have to leave the goods receipt: With + Create new batch you create a new batch including BBD directly at the line item and can select it immediately.

To record multiple BBD for a product in one goods receipt via WMS, you can simply add the same product to the goods receipt multiple times. You can then select an individual BBD for each line item. If the line item is delivered with a BBD that has not yet been recorded in the system, you can create the BBD directly in the goods receipt by selecting Add.

You can then enter the corresponding date:

In the goods receipt view, you can now see the different line items of the product with the respective BBD and (if available) the batch number.

BBD and remaining shelf life of BBD-tracked products can be viewed and analyzed via the menu Batches and BBD under Warehousing:

In the batch overview, in addition to the BBD you will find a Remaining shelf life column, which shows the remaining shelf life in days and is sortable. If no BBD is set, "–" is displayed; if the BBD has been exceeded, a negative remaining shelf life is displayed. You can also use the Remaining shelf life filter to filter by a time window, for example with To (≤) 0 Days to find expired batches, or with To (≤) 14 Days to check stock that will expire soon.

You can also see the tracking information in the product detail in the Stock tab. Depending on the tracking profile, the batch number and/or the BBD including remaining shelf life in days is displayed there. In the detail of a batch, the remaining shelf life is also displayed in the context of the stored BBD.

The remaining shelf life of a BBD-tracked product corresponds to the time range from today until the BBD. With Pickware, you can also work with negative remaining shelf life. If you want to work with negative remaining shelf life, make sure that the minimum remaining shelf life is configured accordingly.

For incoming goods inspection, the stocking list can output the remaining shelf life in days. You can find more on this here.

If you track products with BBD, Pickware automatically proposes a suitable bin location when picking – usually the one with the oldest BBD of the product. If you work via the Admin, this bin location is output accordingly on the picklist. In the WMS App, you can also deliberately deviate from this proposal if needed and pick from a different bin location. Since bin locations for tracked products are managed by pure batch and BBD, the BBD that belongs to the selected bin location is then automatically adopted.

For picking that is as efficient as possible, Pickware also optimizes the picking route so that you have to visit as few bin locations as possible. Minimizing the number of bin locations visited remains a central criterion, so in certain situations the proposals may deviate from a strictly FEFO-sorted order in favor of efficient picking. This is the case, for example, when an order line item cannot be fulfilled completely with the oldest BBD, but can be fulfilled with the second-oldest without additional splitting. In this case, Pickware guides you to the next-oldest suitable BBD to avoid unnecessary additional paths and bin location changes.

The proposals are meant as support and not as a rigid requirement. If you deliberately want to ship a different batch or a different BBD, you can select a different bin location in the WMS App at any time.

If you ship orders via the Admin, batches are determined automatically by bin location order and not proposed by remaining shelf life. For picking based on remaining shelf life, use the WMS App.

Stock is not destocked automatically when the BBD has expired. You always stay in control and decide yourself how to handle expired goods – for example through destocking, write-off, or a special sale.

The fastest way to find goods that have exceeded the BBD is in the menu Batches and BBD using the Remaining shelf life filter. Set To (≤) 0 Days to display all expired batches.

When picking, Pickware automatically proposes BBD that match your configured minimum remaining shelf life. Only stock whose remaining shelf life meets the applicable minimum remaining shelf life is proposed. This ensures that goods with too short a remaining shelf life are not automatically selected for shipping. Batches without a stored BBD are ignored for this check.

You can configure minimum remaining shelf life:

The order of priority is as follows:
​Customer's minimum remaining shelf life > product's minimum remaining shelf life > global remaining shelf life.

This way, for example, you always automatically send customers with specific requirements for remaining shelf life goods with a suitable BBD – without any manual extra effort.

We have two BBD in stock – can I specifically "sell off" only the stock with the short BBD?
Pickware does not assign batch/BBD when an order is received, but when picking. An automatic "shop control" that binds orders to a specific batch in advance is currently not possible. However, Pickware supports you through the FEFO-oriented destocking strategy in booking out older BBD first.

How does BBD work for product sets?
For product sets, tracking is controlled via the subproducts. Only tracked subproducts are handled by BBD/batch accordingly; non-tracked subproducts follow the default destocking strategy.