knowledge base

Thank you for choosing or evaluating inFlow Inventory for your business.

We recommend beginning by doing the Startup Questionnaire if you have not already done so. To access it, select Get Started from the General menu through the inFlow menu button. Now click Startup Questionnaire. This will guide you through setting up your basic company information and some options related to inventory and taxing.

Learning inFlow Inventory

inFlow is designed to be easy to learn. Here are some ways that we suggest you become familiar with the system.

To get help, you can use our built-in tooltips by leaving your mouse over the button or field label, search for help in the Knowledge Base, or visit our Online Forum at http://www.inflowinventory.com.

More information on where to find help

Inventory also has a Sample Database that you can experiment with to become familiar with the system before entering information into your real database.

More information on the Sample Database and Real Database

To get an overview of the functionality that inFlow provides, take a look at the system overview help article. You may also wish to look at the user interface overview help article to get an introduction on how to use inFlow.

Setting up your Business Data

inFlow Inventory keeps track of various different types of business data related to your products, customers, vendors and inventory. 

We recommend putting all of your information into inFlow. The more information you keep in inFlow, the easier it will be to take customer orders and the more informative the reports will be.

Importing Data using the Import Tool

If you already keep your data in a computerized system, like Excel or Quickbooks, then you can use the Import option from the inFlow menu to bring the data into inFlow.

More information on Importing Data

Importing Data Manually

If you do not already keep your data in a computerized system, you will quickly see the benefits in terms of ease of access and order entry. We recommend starting by entering your Product Information.

How to enter product information

Once you have entered your product information, you should enter in how much inventory you have in stock and where it is stored. The easiest way to do this would be by using the Adjust Stock function from the Inventory module.

How to adjust stock

You can then enter your Customer Information.

How to enter customer information

Alternatively, you can choose to add in customer information gradually as you take orders.

You can also choose to enter Vendor Information now if you do a lot of purchasing from different vendors.

How to enter vendor information

Purchasing Inventory
If you’re still wondering what to do next, how about looking at the progress of one item through your inventory?  To start, you’ll have to purchase the item so that you can stock it, this has the added bonus of giving inFlow the information it needs to calculate your cost per item so that you’ll be able to pull accurate profit reports later.  To order stock you’ll have to Create a Purchase Order. 

How to create a purchase order

Is your vendor in the system?  If not, you can add them directly from the PO window by clicking “add” and then filling in their information directly into the purchase order.  And if you want a little more control you might try completing your purchase order in advanced workflow.

Purchase Order in advanced workflow

Selling stock

Let’s assume you’re now going to be selling one of these items to a customer.  To do so you’ll have to Create a Sales Order that includes the items you want to sell.  At this stage you can also add new customers while completing the order (the steps are the same as when you added a new vendor during your purchase order).  

How to Create a Sales Order

For more control you can also try the Advanced Workflow.

How to complete a Sales Order in Advanced workflow

Reporting and the Dashboard

Now that you’ve made a sale and completed purchases you may want to pull reports on your progress.  Check out the Reports Overview to find out how. 

Reports Overview

The dashboard can also help you to quickly determine how your business is doing.

inFlow Dashboard

Once you have familiarized yourself with the basics of inFlow by experimenting with sample data or browsing help articles, and you have entered your business data, you’re all set to start using inFlow to improve your daily operations.

More helpful hints can be found here:

• Youtube Chanel
• inFlow Support Forum
• Knowledge Base

Once you have familiarized yourself with the basics of inFlow by experimenting with sample data or browsing help articles, and you have entered your business data, you’re all set to start using inFlow to improve your daily operations.

Still unsure? Check out our tutorial video!