One stock count for every channel: from the shelf to the courier

Selling the same kurta on your website, Amazon, Flipkart and Myntra is good for sales and hard on stock. Each channel thinks it has the full count. Two orders arrive for the last piece. A return comes back with the wrong tag and nobody notices until the claim window has closed.

The Inventory & Warehouses add-on in TaskSync is built for that problem. This post walks through it in the order the work happens: products, stock, orders, packing, channels and returns.

1. One product master, mapped to every listing

Everything starts with the product master: your products with their SKUs (sizes, colours), bundles and kits, barcodes, HSN, GST rate, MRP, cost, weight and size. You can import it from a file, or build it from the catalogue and order lines TaskSync already has from your stores.

Then every listing on every channel is linked to one master SKU: a Shopify variant, an Amazon seller SKU, a Flipkart listing, a Meesho SKU. TaskSync matches by SKU or barcode where it can. What it cannot match shows on the Unmapped tab, with suggestions, so you link the rest by hand once. A "pack of 2" listing uses two units of the master SKU.

From then on, order lines from every channel point at the master SKU too, which is what makes everything below possible.

2. Warehouses and a stock ledger

Add each place stock is kept: your own warehouses, a 3PL's, and marketplace warehouses such as Amazon FBA or Flipkart Smart. For each SKU in each warehouse you see on hand, reserved, available (on hand minus reserved), damaged and in transit.

Every change goes through the stock ledger: opening stock, receipts, adjustments with a reason, write-offs and transfers between warehouses. Each row shows the quantity before and after, who did it and why. When a SKU falls below its low-stock level, the warehouse manager and owners get an alert in the app.

3. Every order gets a warehouse

When TaskSync is your stock master, each new order is given a warehouse by your rules, in the order you choose: the warehouse fixed for that channel, the one that can ship the whole order, the nearest by pincode, then priority. Its units are reserved there, so available stock drops the moment the order arrives, not when it is packed.

If the warehouse is short, or a line is not mapped yet, the order shows as Needs stock. TaskSync tries again every 10 minutes and reserves it as soon as stock arrives. Cancelled orders release their reservation; shipped orders take the stock out. Orders the marketplace ships itself are skipped.

4. Pick and pack on a phone

The Fulfilment tab shows each warehouse's orders as To pick, To pack, Packed, Needs stock and Handed over, with the ship-by date of every order, which for marketplace orders is the marketplace's own dispatch-by date.

Packing works on a phone. The packer scans the order number or AWB, then each item, with the phone's camera, a scanner gun or by typing. A wrong item is refused on the spot. Where the channel needs it, for example Myntra, or Flipkart for fashion categories, the packer also scans the marketplace tag on each item, and TaskSync keeps it with the order line. A tag that already belongs to another order is refused. Then Mark packed, and at the end of the day hand the parcels to the courier and print the handover sheet.

5. Stock sent to every channel, Dry run first

A stock count only helps if the channels see it. TaskSync works out, for each listing, the units available in the warehouses that serve that channel, minus a buffer you choose, and sends it to Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, Amazon (self-ship offers), Flipkart and Snapdeal. For Meesho and Myntra, which have no open API for this, it makes the stock file you upload in their panel.

Nothing is sent until you switch a channel on, and each one starts in Dry run: TaskSync shows what it would send, so you can check before anything changes. Live needs a preview from the last 24 hours. Every night TaskSync reads the stock on the channels that allow it and lists any differences. A company-wide pause stops all sending at once.

If you already keep stock in Unicommerce or EasyEcom, set the stock master to that system. TaskSync then keeps the product master, mapping, packing and returns, and leaves the channels' stock to them.

6. Prices, bulk edits and listings

With TaskSync manages prices switched on, each channel gets its price from the master: the sale price while a sale is on, times a factor, plus an amount, then rounded to 499 or 1,299 if you like. Guard rails are built in: a price above MRP is never sent, a price below cost is refused unless you allow it, and a big drop is held until someone confirms it.

The bulk editor changes prices, MRP, brand, category, HSN, GST, weight, status and low-stock levels of many products at once, with a preview and undo for 7 days. Templates can run on a schedule. And new products can be published to Shopify, WooCommerce and Magento from the master, with a pre-filled listing file for Amazon, Flipkart, Snapdeal, Meesho and Myntra.

7. Returns, tags and claims

Every return and RTO becomes one inventory return, whether it was announced by the marketplace, a returns file, an aggregator, a support case or the courier. When it arrives, the warehouse scans it in and checks each unit: is it the SKU we sent, what condition is it in, and does the marketplace tag match the one captured at packing? Photos and a video can be required.

Each unit is then put back into stock, set aside as damaged or written off, through the stock ledger. Where something is wrong, a claim is prepared with the evidence: photos, the tag scans and the packing record, with the deadline shown and alerts before it passes.

Getting started

1. Build the product master and clear the Unmapped tab.
2. Add warehouses and load opening stock.
3. Switch on allocation and choose where tags are needed.
4. Put one channel on Dry run, check it for a day, then go Live.

Inventory & Warehouses is an Enterprise add-on on top of the E-commerce operations hub, priced by quote. You can pick both at sign-up and try them free during the trial. Read more on Inventory & Warehouses and Marketplaces, or see Pricing.