Adjustments, counts & transfers

The three ways stock changes outside of a sale or a purchase: a manual correction, a physical recount, or a move between branches — plus the one-time opening stock screen.

Overview

Sales reduce stock and purchases increase it automatically — but real shops also need to correct stock by hand: something gets damaged, a recount finds a discrepancy, or a branch needs stock moved from another one. MiniMart covers this with four screens that all share the same underlying idea: nothing changes on-hand quantity until it's posted. Every adjustment and count can be built and saved as a draft first — reviewed, corrected, even abandoned — with zero effect on stock, and only takes effect the moment someone posts it.

Why it's useful

Without a reason-coded, draft-then-post workflow, stock corrections become invisible guesswork — a quantity just changes and nobody can say why, by whom, or how much it cost you. Requiring a reason on every adjustment means your shrinkage, damage and write-off numbers are something you can actually run a report on later, not just a feeling. The draft step means a count or correction in progress can't accidentally throw off what the POS sells against while someone is still entering lines.

Step by step

Stock Adjustments

1. Click New adjustment

   Pick the branch (if you have more than one) and give the adjustment a reason — e.g. "Damage", "Theft write-off" or "Count Correction" — chosen from your store's managed list of adjustment reasons.

2. Add lines

   For each product, enter the quantity change (positive to add stock you found, negative to remove stock that's gone) and an optional note.

3. Save as Draft

   A draft has no effect on stock yet — safe to leave half-finished or come back to later.

4. Post it

   Posting is the step that actually changes on-hand quantity and writes an entry to Stock activity. Review the lines before posting — it's the point of no casual return.

Stock Counts

1. Start a count

   Choose a full count (every product at the branch) or a partial count (a category, or a hand-picked list) — useful for counting a section of the shop without stopping the whole till.

2. Enter the counted quantity per line

   MiniMart shows the system's expected quantity alongside what you actually counted, and calculates the variance automatically.

3. Review variances, then post

   Posting corrects on-hand stock to match what was physically counted — exactly the same draft→posted lifecycle as an adjustment.

Transfers

1. Create a transfer

   Pick a source branch and a destination branch (see Multi-branch), then add the products and quantities to move.

2. Dispatch

   Stock leaves the source branch immediately — it's deducted from source on-hand as soon as you dispatch, using that branch's own cost at the time, so the transfer carries its own value snapshot.

3. Receive

   Once the goods physically arrive, mark the transfer received at the destination branch, which is what adds the stock there. Between dispatch and receive, the stock is in transit — accounted for at neither branch's on-hand count, so nothing is ever double-counted.

Opening Stock

A one-time screen used when you first set up a store or a new branch, to declare your starting quantities before any sales have happened. Enter what you physically have on the shelf for each product and post it once — after that, this screen is meant to stay empty; ongoing corrections belong in Stock Adjustments or a Stock Count instead.

Adjustment & count reasons

Reasons are a managed list — a code, a label, a sort order and an active flag — editable under Settings as "Adjustment reasons". Deactivating a reason hides it from new entries without touching any adjustment that already used it. The same reason-list pattern is reused for return reasons (see Returns & refunds) and cash-mismatch reasons at shift close (see Shifts & cash drawer) — one consistent idea in three places.

Tips & best practices

• Pick (or add) a specific reason rather than a generic "Other" — it's the only thing that makes a shrinkage report meaningful later.
• Run partial counts on a rolling schedule (a different section each week) rather than one exhausting full count a year — discrepancies get caught sooner and counting a smaller area is more accurate.
• Dispatch a transfer only when the goods are actually leaving — stock is deducted from the source branch at that moment, not when you first create the transfer.
• Treat Opening Stock as a one-time setup step; if you find yourself using it regularly, you probably want a Stock Adjustment or a Stock Count instead.

Notes & warnings