Order cost troubleshooting
Learn how to troubleshoot issues with your order material costs.
Having trouble with your material costs calculating incorrectly for an order? Here are a few things you can try to get your orders to cost correctly!
In this article, we'll cover:
- Order material costs are zero
- Order costs are lower or higher than expected
- Order has a cost but appears in the uncosted filter
Before we begin:
Order material costs are automatically calculated when your order is shipped and are calculated from your stock adjustments for each product in the order.
It is important to note that any manufactures associated with the order will not be used directly to calculate the material cost - this is because manufactures can produce stock for more than one order.
Order material cost is zero.
An order can be costed as zero (0.00) for several reasons, we'll cover each one below.
To find which of your orders have a zero cost, see this article: How can I find my uncosted orders?
Is the shipped date set for the order?
The material cost for the order is automatically costed when the order is marked as shipped, so if your order does not yet have a shipped date, it will display as either a dash (-) or a zero value. To fix this, ensure your order has been set with the correct shipped date.
Instructions on how to set the order shipped date can be found here: How do I mark an order as shipped?
Do you have enough stock on hand?
If the order is marked as shipped, it may be an issue with stock levels. If there was not enough stock of this product on the date the order was shipped, it will be costed as zero until this is rectified.
To identify if this is the issue with your order:
- Navigate to the product or variation page (How do I find my product page?)
- Click on the tab called Adjustments.
- Look through the list of adjustments that appear until you find the adjustment created by the order. The adjustments are in date order, and you'll want to look for the order's shipped date here.
You'll want to look at what appears in the column under Status. If this is a red clipboard, then there was not enough stock on hand for the shipped date to fulfill the order - this is why the order line item was $0.00.
To fix this, you'll want to review the manufactures and starting adjustments before this adjustment to see if you are missing any that would account for the missing stock.
Tip: You'll also find guidance on the probable reason for the issue when you hover your mouse over the yellow warning triangle next to the calculated material cost.
Adding the missing stock via manufactures will automatically recalculate all stock levels after the manufacture date, so this will automatically calculate the order cost for you. The recalculation may take a couple of minutes if you have many adjustments for the product/variation.
Note: Adding stock via manual adjustments is not recommended, as it will be added to your inventory with a zero value. You'll want to ensure all stock is costed correctly by adding manufactures or a starting adjustment value (if you have brought stock forward from a previous system).
Are your manufactures correctly costed?
Suppose the clipboard is green in the adjustment history for the product/variation. In that case, this issue is most likely due to previous manufactures being calculated as zero: this is passing the value up to the products sold.
To determine if this is the cause, review the manufactures before the order adjustment and look in the Material Cost column to see what they were costed as. If they are zero, you'll want to now move onto the troubleshooting guide for zero costed manufactures to rectify the issue. Once you have fixed the issue with the manufacture(s) then the adjustments and order costings will automatically recalculate for you.
Note: the recalculation may take a couple of minutes if you have many adjustments for the product/variation.
The order material cost is incorrect
If you find that your material cost for an order seems incorrect, please follow the steps below to troubleshoot the problem:
Check that your Order has a Shipped Date
The material cost calculations only occur when an order has been marked as Shipped.
When the Order is marked with a Shipped Date, it is this date that is used to pinpoint the cost of manufacture, which is then assigned as a cost to your order line item. While the order is unshipped, the material cost will always be zero as it is, up to this point, included in your raw material inventory totals.
Check your manufacture history.
If an order item does not yet have a manufacture history, it will have a zero material cost until the adjustment history is added. Adding in the missing backdated manufactures will automatically recalculate all adjustments and thus all order material costs. You can review your manufacture history for each product by clicking on the Adjustments tab on your products page.
Ensure the relevant manufactures are dated before the shipped date for the order.
As the weighted average cost calculation uses your adjustment history to determine the cost of the manufactured goods sold, dates are extremely important. If your order has a shipped date before your manufacture, then the manufacture cost will not be included in the calculation.
Review your Manual Product Adjustments
Any positive manual inventory adjustments you have added to the product will have increased your stock. Still, as no cost will be associated with the adjustment, these adjustments will " dilute " your real costs.
Tip: It is recommended that you avoid adding positive inventory adjustments and instead create manufactures to account for the stock increase so that they are fully costed in the system.
Review your Starting Quantity Adjustments
If you moved to Craftybase from a different system, you may have added a Unit Cost along with your starting quantities. These adjustments are fully costed into your rolling averages. Bringing a large quantity of stock into Craftybase without a cost attributed (i.e., zero) will dilute and affect your cost calculations going forward.
It is recommended that you review all Starting Adjustments and either:
- Add an accurate unit cost for any stock brought forward into the system or
- If you are tracking back to the date of manufacture, set your starting quantity as 0.00 and add a manufacture to account for the creation of all products.
Order has a cost but is included when filtering by Not Costed.
If your order has a cost and has been shipped but still appears in the list of uncosted orders, it may be because some of the line items do not have a material manufacture cost attributed to them.
To correct this issue, you'll want to first identify which order line items have 0.00 cost, then, walk through the following steps:
Check your manufacture history
If an order item does not yet have a manufacture history, it will have a zero material cost until the adjustment history is added. Adding in the missing backdated manufactures will automatically recalculate all adjustments and thus all order material costs. You can review your manufacture history for each product by clicking on the Adjustments tab on your products page.
Ensure the relevant manufactures are dated before the shipped date for the order.
As the weighted average cost calculation uses your adjustment history to determine the cost of the manufactured goods sold, dates are extremely important. If your order has a shipped date before your manufacture, then the manufacture cost will not be included in the calculation.
Review your Manual Product Adjustments
Any positive manual inventory adjustments you have added to the product will have increased your stock. Still, as no cost will be associated with the adjustment, these adjustments will " dilute " your real costs.
Review your Starting Quantity Adjustments
If you moved to Craftybase from a different system, you may have added a Unit Cost along with your starting quantities. These adjustments are fully costed into your rolling averages. Bringing a large quantity of stock into Craftybase without a cost attributed (i.e., zero) will dilute and affect your cost calculations going forward.
It is recommended that you review all Starting Adjustments and either:
- Add an accurate unit cost for any stock brought forward into the system or
- If you are tracking back to the date of manufacture, set your starting quantity as 0.00 and add a manufacture to account for the creation of all products.