Food wholesaler: from warehouse to driver in one system

What came after launch

Months are counted from project kick-off. Each period also covers analysis and live testing on the client's side; the implementation itself took only part of it.

1. Months 3–4

   Delivery route planner

   Implementation itself: about 3 weeks; rest of the period: route analysis and specification, testing and tuning in live operation at the client, warehouse training

   Map-based route planning from unshipped orders and WMS picking status, printed route sheets, and the dispatch date written back to POHODA.

   Benefit: The dispatcher builds routes in one place from the current state of orders and picking, without comparing data across two systems. The dispatch date is written to the documents automatically; an automatic dispatch e‑mail to the customer was added later.

2. Months 4–5

   Automated handling of e‑shop promotions

   Implementation itself: 1–2 weeks; rest of the period: clarifying promotion rules, testing on real orders and tuning in live operation at the client

   Offers such as 4+1 or 3+1 flow from the e‑shop through POHODA to the warehouse as zero-price lines; drinks are rounded to full cartons.

   Benefit: Free items no longer have to be added to orders by hand, and the warehouse picks exactly what the customer received in the promotion. The client sets up each promotion itself as a standard POHODA price action.

3. Months 5–7

   Receivables and sales reports, expiry dates on the e‑shop

   Implementation itself: about 3 weeks; rest of the period: data analysis and clean-up, verifying the reports in the client's operation and gradual additions

   An overview of unpaid receivables by days overdue, updated twice a day; turnover per customer with the last-order date; and the nearest expiry dates on each product page.

   Benefit: Management sees unpaid invoices up to date without compiling reports by hand and can chase overdue customers in good time. Customers know the shelf life of goods when they order.

4. Months 6–8

   EDI with retail chains

   Implementation itself: about 3 weeks; rest of the period: contracts and testing with the EDI provider and retail chains, certification and connecting further chains one by one

   Retail-chain orders arrive electronically straight in POHODA, and dispatch advice and invoices go back the same way; another chain was added in month 16.

   Benefit: Chain orders no longer have to be re-typed, which removes the risk of errors in items and quantities. Dispatch advice and invoices reach the chains in structured form with no manual preparation.

5. Months 7–8

   Daily supply report for purchasing

   Implementation itself: 2–3 weeks; rest of the period: verifying the data with the buyers in daily operation and adjustments based on their feedback

   Per item: supplier, sales over 7, 14 and 30 days, open orders, availability and the five nearest expiry dates – daily in the buyers' spreadsheet.

   Benefit: Buyers order from current data without assembling exports by hand, and the expiry overview helps them sell short-dated stock in time and avoid write-offs. From month 16 the data can be refreshed with one click in POHODA and is current within about 10 minutes.

6. Months 8–9

   Automatic bank statements

   Implementation itself: about 1 week; rest of the period: setting up bank access and certificates and verifying payment matching in live operation

   Statements from two banks are loaded into POHODA automatically every day, and incoming payments are matched to invoices.

   Benefit: The accounts team finds the statements already in POHODA in the morning and handles by hand only the payments that did not match. Receivables are therefore up to date every day.

7. Months 10–11

   Shipping charge and e‑shop availability check

   Implementation itself: about 2 weeks; rest of the period: agreeing the shipping-price rules, testing on real orders and tuning in live operation at the client

   An automatic shipping charge based on order value, and a daily check for items in stock that cannot be ordered online, and the reverse.

   Benefit: The shipping charge is added to the order automatically by the client's rules, with no manual calculation. The daily report reveals goods sitting in the warehouse unsold only because of an e‑shop setting, so a mismatch is caught by the next day at the latest.

8. Months 11–13

   Attendance with chip terminals

   Implementation itself: about 3–4 weeks; rest of the period: offer approval, delivery of chips and terminal, trial operation and fine-tuning at the client

   An attendance system with chip terminals for warehouse staff and drivers: meal vouchers, holidays, breaks and monthly timesheets.

   Benefit: Monthly timesheets and meal-voucher entitlements are produced automatically from the chip-terminal data, so they no longer have to be compiled by hand. The recorded attendance also serves as the basis for measuring warehouse staff performance.

9. Months 11–14

   Excise duty and customs reporting

   Implementation itself: about 5–6 weeks; rest of the period: preparing the tax warehouse and terminal, customs requirements, coordination with the WMS vendor and testing the reports in live operation

   Tax-warehouse positions, alcohol attributes on stock cards, daily data for the customs report and a monthly alcohol record.

   Benefit: The data for the mandatory daily customs report is generated automatically as XML. This cuts the effort and the risk of errors in statutory reporting.

10. Months 12–13

    Production, warehouse performance and reporting

    Implementation itself: about 4–5 weeks; rest of the period: refining requirements with production and the warehouse, installing the kiosk and screen and verifying in live operation

    A production portal with a kiosk, picker performance on a warehouse TV screen, a cash-flow overview, and delivery routes assigned automatically from the delivery address.

    Benefit: Production and transfer documents are created in POHODA straight from the portal, with no manual entry. The warehouse manager follows performance as it happens, management has cash flow in one place, and new customers get a delivery route without manual assignment.

11. Months 14–15

    Staff performance and dispatch SMS

    Implementation itself: about 2 weeks; rest of the period: setting norms and matching people between attendance and the WMS, testing SMS and verifying in the client's operation

    Per-worker output from WMS tasks and hours worked from attendance; customers get an SMS with the delivery date when the order is dispatched.

    Benefit: A report of lines and kilograms per hour against norms arrives by e‑mail on a regular schedule, so management does not have to gather and compare performance by hand. Customers know the delivery date in advance.

12. Months 15–16

    Route portal and driver app

    Implementation itself: about 3–4 weeks; rest of the period: trial operation with the warehouse and drivers, adjustments based on feedback and gradual ramp-up in live operation

    Each route tracked from plan through loading to delivery, a driver app that confirms deliveries even offline (rolling out), and cash payments settled by QR code.

    Benefit: A scan check at loading lets errors be caught before the van leaves. Cash collected by drivers is assigned to invoices by scanning a QR code, with an audit trail.

13. Month 16

    Self-service imports and dunning

    Implementation itself: about 2 weeks; rest of the period: dry run of the reminders, checking output with invoicing and handing the imports over to departments

    A wizard in which staff import and update POHODA data from spreadsheets themselves, and automatic five-level reminders with a daily summary.

    Benefit: Departments make bulk data changes themselves, without waiting for a developer. Reminders with the invoice PDF go out automatically by days overdue, invoicing gets a daily summary, and selected customers can be excluded from dunning.