In the last blog, we discussed the functional overview of e-procurement which includes indent management, inventory management, tender management, auction management, supplier management, contract management, and delivery fulfillment. All these modules have been divided into 4 phases. Each phase has its own importance and influence on procurement operations. Today we will talk about Phase 1 which involves inventory management and indent management. It deals with planning, forecasting, budgeting, inventory checks, and request approvals.

Inventory Management
Inventory management means optimizing the inventory of an enterprise or procurement team to enable unobstructed sales, procurement, production, and service without having to compromise cost. The four primary components that are applied to inventory management are procurement, inventory control, demand forecasting, and reverse logistics.

Indent Management
Indent Management’s function is to allow users from different departments to create and submit indent requests. The requests are for procuring work and other goods. It also helps in estimating the cost of works and goods, as well as aggregating the demand for goods.

Creating Indent is the first step of the e-procurement process. By the indent, the department is analyzing the need for work/service/goods and cost estimation. Indent Management solutions are fully in compliance and based on PKI Digital Signature Certificate (DSC). Creating indent online becomes as easy as drafting a mail.

Process
Indent Management is divided into 2 parts, i.e, Indent Preparation, and Indent Approval. Indent preparation involves users with appropriate access codes, which can initiate and prepare an indent/ requisition. A list of required items is prepared, mentioned with their technical specifications. Indent preparation is governed by one or more user-defined workflows. The next step introduces indent approval, which is done through the access codes allotted to managers as per their authority. Once an indent is approved, the tendering process begins.

Key Features
Some of the key features of the Indent Management system are its user accessibility, ease in creation of indents, the digital signature-based approval process, database of previous indent requisitions, creation, and approval of indents progress through approved authorized personnel and, real-time updates with e-mail alerts. Indenting is the process of recording the demand. Indents can be prepared in the e-Procurement system or can be pulled from an ERP or EDI system. Most e-Procurement solutions have indent approval and indent assignment features. Indent Management helps an organization in eliminating paperwork, redundant and repetitive tasks, instead, it replaces the traditional method with a flexible dashboard with real-time updates. It improves staffing and saves time in the approval process.

Challenge and our solution
There was an instance, where a client wanted to transform his existing traditional indenting method. The requirement for a digital-based system was his priority as being in the wholesale domain his entire business of sales and distribution deal with indenting almost every hour of the day. The time consumed, staff allocation, documentation, and delayed updates were his primary issues.

Our C1 solution for Indent Management provided him with a flexible and user-friendly platform, where he was able to assign authority and delegation for indent requests and approvals. Our solution helped him save time in the duration of the process, provided a centralized data- center, digital signature-based feature made the process faster and paperless. The real-time updates were his key takeaway which ultimately helped him in decision making and retracting insightful information.