How can I automatically process orders? (Pack & Go)

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Purpose: Learn how to use Pack & Go to automatically prepare and process your orders one by one. This guide will help you efficiently manage your shipments, ensuring each order is ready for immediate dispatch.

What is Pack & Go?

Pack & Go is designed to facilitate easier picking and packing when you have a warehouse, stock room, or packing location. It’s available to users on our Growth and Premium plan and allows you to print packing slips and/or picking lists to process your orders faster, either in conjunction with a bar-code scanner (Scanner mode) or without (Automatic mode). In this article, we will explain how Pack & Go Automatic mode can streamline your workflow for an efficient picking and packing process. 

Automatic or Scanner mode? 

If you have a limited range of products and/or do not require a warehouse walk-through to pick items, Automatic is the ideal Pack & Go mode:

• The orders are displayed on the screen one at a time with a list of products to be included.
  This saves time in looking for specific orders or having to manually type details into the search bar in order to locate a label so the associated products can be packed.
• You can simply pack the box based on the products in the order as they appear on the screen, print the label and/or packing slip to be included, and then the next order in the queue will appear automatically on screen.
  
  
• Orders can be processed using a keyboard or mouse and will appear in order from newest to oldest/oldest to newest, based on your settings. 

Read on to see how to configure Pack & Go Automatic mode and create the ideal picking/packing workflow. 

Step 1: Select Automatic mode 

Pack & Go offers the possibility to process orders with or without a scanner. To set up processing without a scanner, visit Settings > Pack & Go settings. Next, select Automatic:

Within Settings > Pack & Go settings, you can also filter based on the type of orders you want to process:

• Whether you want orders to appear in the queue based on Newest or Oldest first:
  
• And choose to have only orders with the payment status "paid" appear in the queue for picking and packing:  
  

Step 2: Item packing

If you prefer, you can select the "Enable item packing" checkbox. By doing so, you activate the ability to scan items as you pack them, providing an extra layer of verification before creating the shipping label.

You can choose to create labels when:

• Only when all items are packed
• Allow, with warning if not all items are packed
• Always allow

The item scanning is related to the EAN code. Therefore, this option is only available for integration where we import the EAN code. 

Optional features

Step 3: Print options

In the Pack & Go tab, you can select whether or not you want to automatically print packing slips alongside your labels:
Go to Shipping > Pack & Go > Click on settings > Select Create packing slips and select the A4 printer you wish to use. 

Step 4: Start processing your orders

Once your settings are set up, it's time to get packing! Click on Pack & Go and you will see that the orders received from your webshop integration will appear one by one on your screen:

The items included in the order are listed on the page. If you have a limited range of products and/or do not require a warehouse walk-through to pick and pack items, Automatic is the ideal Pack & Go mode to simply pack the box based on the products in the order as they appear on the screen. 

• If an order has errors such as a missing house number or incorrect postcode, you will be prompted to correct the order by clicking the pen icon + Edit button before proceeding. 
• If a shipping rule has been applied to the order based on the rules you have already configured, the blue lightning bolt icon will appear, as in the example above. 

Filter your orders

You can filter your orders to help packers process and pack only the correct orders. This way, the packer will not have to search manually for the relevant orders, as they will all show up in the screen together with the items. E.g.: The packer needs to focus only on the urgent orders that will be shipped with a specific carrier.

You can use the following filters:

• Integration
• Date Range
• Carrier

Click the relevant filter and select your preference from the drop-down menu, then click Apply selection.

Step 5: Edit your order

In the menu on the right side, you can adjust the sender address and/or the shipping method and weight.

This is why it's handy to set up your Shipping Rules - for example, if you have set up a Shipping Rule to indicate that all orders shipping to a specific country should be shipped with a specific shipping method, you won't need to manually edit the order in this menu because the rule will be automatically applied. You can simply process orders one by one as they appear, knowing that the correct rules are automatically applied without any manual editing!

Step 6: Create label and print

When the order is picked, press Create label to print your label and/or packing slip. Once processed, you will automatically proceed to the next order in the queue. Don't forget to include your packing slip in the box if you choose to print one - click here to read more about how packing slips and picking lists work. 

If you want to skip an order in the queue for now, just press the next button. The order you skipped will still be in the queue for when you want to go back to it later. Simple! 

What's next?

Want to use Pack & Go with a barcode scanner and/or picking lists? Click here to see how to use Scanner mode. 

Related articles:

→ Pack & Go with a barcode scanner and/or picking lists 

→ How can I prevent surcharges

→ How to calculate volumetric weight