A freight factor indicates how the vendor addresses the items on the purchase order. Some vendors go strictly by cost and the freight factor would remain Dollars. Some vendors are concerned about weight or amount of the shipment and would therefore use Weight or Pieces as the freight factor. The system uses a default factor to estimate freight charges when the actual amount is not known at the time of purchase order creation. For example, you want to charge freight on all shipments. However, you do not want to enter freight charges for each purchase order, but you do not want a shipment to go out without a freight charge. You can set up a default freight charge of $20. This way, if a shipment charge does not get calculated, you still collect some compensation. You can define a default freight factor at the buy line or the product level.
The system multiplies the freight factor by the item’s average cost to produce an estimated freight charge for the line item. You can override the estimated freight charge after a purchase order is created, after the actual freight charges are known either from the freight carrier or the bill of lading. You can override freight charges for individual products, or distribute a lump charge across all line items on the purchase order.
To define a default freight factor for a buy line:
From the Purchase > Maintenance menu, select Buy Line Maintenance to display the Buy Line Maintenance window.
In the Buy Line ID field, enter a buy line name and press Enter.
From the Information menu, select Freight Factor to display the Freight Factor Maintenance window.
Note: The Freight Factor field cannot contain more than two integers and four decimal point integers.
For each branch or territory, specify an estimated freight charge for the products in this buy line as a percentage of the purchase price. The system uses this charge when the actual freight charge is not known at time the of purchase order creation. After entering a number, the system appends a % sign to the number in the Factor column. For example, if you enter 2 the system displays 2.0000%.
Note: An asterisk (*) indicates an override at the branch level.
Exit the window to save your changes and return to the Buy Line Maintenance window.
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