In creating the inventory in the ledger, it is essential to have a structured framework for all products. In the case of a book store, one would consider a 6 to 8 product code wherein the first two digits/characters depict a broad category while the last two depict more particular detail.
For example used for the materials in one Bahá'í Institute, a 8 character code was developped following this framework:
First two digits were for board categories: JY for Junior Youth, CC for Children Class books and “01,02, etc” for Study Circle materials
Next four digits were for a description: “Glimmerings of Hope” became “GOH1”, “Children Class Grade 1” became “G001”
The second-to-last digit expressed the role; such as “G” for General Use, “P” for Pupil/Participant Use and “T” for Teacher/Tutor Use.
The last digit referred to the language in which the books were in: “E” for English, “S” for Swahili etc.
Using this framework, codes together with their descriptions came out as:
ChildClassGr1-Teacher Eng
CCG001TE
ChildClassGr1-Pupil Eng
CCG001PE
Glimmerings of Hope-Eng
JYGOH1GE
Ruhi Book2 English
02BK02GE
A Bahá'í book store may well use the above structure but using the first two digits to tag the broad category of authors; such as “AB” for 'Abdu'l-Bahá or “SE” for Shoghi Effendi.
Note: The importance of such a structure becomes very evident when entering such codes particularly in the Sales Invoice. Typing the first few characters and press “Return” gives one a short list of those products starting with those characters.
Note: Products with their respective codes, sell price, quantities need to be entered first prior to having any particular product appear on the invoice. To enter a product, go to Good&Services->Add Part. Should the product attract VAT, be sure the VAT box is ticked. If not, untick this box. Put “pc” as the unit (unless its a “box” of some quantity) and the sell price – all these appear in the Sales Invoice.
Note: one needs to create at least one warehouse. Go to System->Warehouses->Add Warehouse then give at least in its “Description” a basic name such as “Main Store”.