The year is quickly coming to a close and that means that it is time to start planning for your annual year-end physical inventory count. This will help ensure the count goes as smoothly as possible.

1. Train

Ensuring your employees are properly trained is the first step to an effective year-end inventory count.

While inventory counts may seem straightforward, there are many mistakes that can be made, which could negatively affect your inventory counting accuracy. These could include;

• counting parts without verifying the part number,
• counting packages with multiple units as a single unit,
• missing parts that are not clearly visible or improperly labelled,
• and much more.

2. Organize

Once you have ensured your employees have the necessary skills and understanding to conduct an accurate year-end inventory, you want to be sure your inventory is organized and ready to be counted.

While most automotive dealerships do their best to maintain an organized inventory throughout the year, parts can be misplaced or sorted out of order. If you are one of the many who need to organize their inventory, start by ensuring bins, shelves and packaging are properly labelled, organize the same parts in one place, whenever possible, and avoid putting parts that look too similar close together.

3. Count

Now that your inventory is sorted, it is time to start the physical count.

While it may be best to perform your count after hours, it isn’t always possible. If you must count during work hours, be sure to communicate with other departments, such as service and receiving, to ensure that they know their roles and the proper procedures. You also want to let all of your employees know not to move parts, unless they are being sold. In this case, they will need to be properly recorded as sold after counted.

If this is not a feasible option, consider hiring a third-party inventory management company. At Pro Count West, we have the skills and expertise needed to conduct your inventory count accurately and with minimal disruption.

We will collect and provide inventory data and report on the overall physical and financial health of your automotive parts department.

Your staff will benefit from the resulting inventory reporting as it will help them sharpen their oversight of aged parts and help to expedite the disposal of obsolete inventory, resulting in a gain for your overall cash position. Most importantly, it will ensure your inventory has been properly counted for record-keeping and tax purposes.

For more information on our services, contact us today.