Taking Inventory

ScorpionReaver

Hi guys, stellar job all of you are doing selling Lego and whatnot.

I have made several orders, and I just want to point out how frustrating it is when you make an order, only to have the seller reply after a day or two "Oh, sorry, I know the system said we had that part, but we're out."
Or
"Hey, I know you ordered 10 of those, but I only have 5. Derp, sorry!"

Ugh.

Sometimes the only reason I make an order is for that one part that you are now out of.
It's especially frustrating for international orders.

How about a routine inventory, where you verify your quantities on hand?

Would save a lot of buyer frustration and "Well, I'm certainly not shopping with THEM any more!"

Thanks and have a great day.

Teup

It's impossible to make generalisations on this since different sellers have different error rates, but anyway, counting an entire inventory all over again pretty much doubles the work load. Translated to your experience, it'd technically mean everything you buy would be twice as expensive :P It would take humongous amounts of time to recount even my not too large shop, the size that only just earns me enough to live off.

Now of course, this is no excuse for items to be missing on a frequent basis. I am missing items in I'd say one in 20 to one in 30 orders. Up to 1 in 10 should be alright as long as communication is perfect. I agree the seller always has to ask first on how to proceed if a substantial amount of a lot (or an entire lot) is missing.

I guess sellers will just need to pay more attention? :P It's an experience thing, things that I'm missing usually stem from several years ago. These days I work pretty structured. If you just do part outs, store the items unambiguously, and don't mess with the inventory between storage and sale, everything should be right where it belongs

Ironically, my suppliers are missing items ALOT more often. Actually, they've been missing items on every order I placed. They are supposed to supply all toy stores, and even they don't get it right, go figure :P

Markyd7

Hi scorpionreaver

I fully understand your frustration.
I have to send out a few messages like that every month unfortunately and I guess every store has to do this now and then.

My store is of medium size and I'm selling about 6000 parts a month, which means I'm also adding 6000 to keep my store at the same size or more if I'm expanding it. There's plenty or room for error.
In the past I'm sure I've sent out more parts by accident! Unfortunately the customer doesn't let us know when this happens.
Or I've sent dark stone instead of medium stone.
Miscounted when parting out.
Missing parts in sets.

Do other stores do inventory checks?

Mark

ScorpionReaver

Hi guys, thanks for the comments.

This has happened three times this week. Very frustrating.

Just venting. Trying to make something constructive out of unfortunate circumstances.

Hoddie

I do a stock check every month but I've narrowed the check down to rare part/colour combinations. If any other parts are AWOL I'll either open sealed sets from my private collection or go out and buy a set (or sets) with the missing part(s) in.

Even doing all this I sometimes have to send the old "I'm sorry, the following parts could not be found" message occasionally.

Teup

Hi guys, thanks for the comments.

This has happened three times this week. Very frustrating.

Just venting. Trying to make something constructive out of unfortunate circumstances.

I agree that's much, and it's annoying. Could be just chance, or it could be sellers being more inaccurate than they humanly need to be. Makes one want to brainstorm about some kind of feedback system that addresses order accuracy besides the positive/negative experience.. Because right now there could be sellers that get every other order wrong, and we'll never really find out about it.. it's something a buyer usually lets slide and then forgets about..

ScorpionReaver

I think I've just had a run of bad luck.

52 orders placed at Brick Owl in 4 weeks. Most of it has been good.

After this latest transaction, whew, yes I think we need a "Seller Report Card" of sorts.

As for my earlier inventory comment and your feedback, I agree that it's likely not feasible for such a large inventory of such tiny pieces.
Maybe an inventory of select parts in your store as they get low?
For example: Print out a list of whatever you have, say, less than 10 of? And go verify quantities.
Quality control.

Once again, the majority of sellers I have dealt with here really have it together. I have been a repeat customer for my favourites

Brikomania

Did a full inventory first time after 3 years, it only took two months!

Agreed it's really annoying, for both seller and buyer.

I think the best way is just to be careful when parting out and picking orders and doing some random checks when you sell a part and you can see quantity left.

Teup

I think I've just had a run of bad luck.

52 orders placed at Brick Owl in 4 weeks. Most of it has been good.

After this latest transaction, whew, yes I think we need a "Seller Report Card" of sorts.

Maybe, then again, I'm currently having one of these annoying cases again where the buyer has set the payment status to "payment submitted" but nothing is arriving, and the buyer is not responding. And there's not really anything I can do about this except for marking it as a non payment which shows up as a tiny number in the buyer's profile. So BrickOwl has a very mild attitude towards flagging both sellers and buyers alike.. If the seller part woulc change, I'd like the buyer part to be on the same level.

As for my earlier inventory comment and your feedback, I agree that it's likely not feasible for such a large inventory of such tiny pieces.

Maybe an inventory of select parts in your store as they get low?
For example: Print out a list of whatever you have, say, less than 10 of? And go verify quantities.
Quality control.

Hmm, no, this is not how it works in my experience Sellers don't miss parts because at some point stock gets low and things get somehow critical. They're missing parts because of a wide array of possible errors, either in on the digital side or on the physical side of things. The error could be 1 part, or it could be 100 parts or 1000 parts. Errors are not that common (if you consider how many lots work out fine), but whenever they do occur, it can really have any kind of freaky reason. It's not about parts running out, it's about a mismatch between the digital and the physical part and that can have any kind of cause. Error syncing different shops, errors in inventories of sets (that the seller bought 100 copies of and parted out), ...

By the way, a small lot is not more likely to result in the seller not having enough than a large lot. Big lots have about an equal chance of selling out completely. It's exactly because they are big that it attracts buyers that really want the entire stock.

So, errors can be both small and big, and lots that instantly sell out completely can be both small and big

Stragus

Hmm, no, this is not how it works in my experience Sellers don't miss parts because at some point stock gets low and things get somehow critical. They're missing parts because of a wide array of possible errors, either in on the digital side or on the physical side of things. The error could be 1 part, or it could be 100 parts or 1000 parts. Errors are not that common (if you consider how many lots work out fine), but whenever they do occur, it can really have any kind of freaky reason.

Over here, the most common case for running out of parts is sending extras by error to a previous customer. A few times, we ended up sending both the parts ordered and the remaining ones, emptying out the whole lot.

And customers never complain whey they receive ten times the quantity ordered.

ScorpionReaver

I've received extra parts one time, contacted the seller and told them just in case they wanted to adjust their inventory. They replied and said they always threw in a few extra parts, and thanked me for my business

So yeah, I'd be the guy to mention that I received extra.

Oh, and holding buyers and sellers alike accountable for their actions?
I wouldn't have it any other way!