Sales Forecasting

The Sales Forecasting module is primarily designed for use with CTSOP it may also be useful where Bakery SOP is used. As it relies on the data held in the Article File, this file must contain details of products to be involved in the Sales Forecasting process.

Forecasts are always entered and recorded in Sales Units. Forecasts once set can be exported to the CTSOP Totals files or the BSOP Ad-Hoc totals file, where they may be used to plan production or project future raw material requirements. Forecasts can be maintained as required in line with current sales levels.

Sales Forecasting has been designed to enable the system to compute weekly figures without the need for actual weekly sales estimates to be entered, this assists greatly in the practical maintenance of sales estimates. Forecasts can be entered for single or groups of customers, for normal or special/promotional orders.

Ultimately the Sales Forecasting quantity is broken down into days, for entry purposes figures may be entered for periods of 1,7,30,90,180, or 365, this is achieved by entering Quantity Type together with a start and end date which enables the system to calculate the number of elapsed days between these dates.

A mixture of periods may also be used depending on the pattern of your sales. Where trade is constant throughout the year a period of 365 and a single entry for the estimated annual sales will suffice. On the other hand where trade is subject to seasonal swing it may be necessary to enter say one figure to cover the first quarter of the year then six separate monthly figures finishing up the year with another quarterly amount. The normal order forecast can be supplemented with say a promotional order forecast for a number of weeks at the height of the season, this promotional order forecast will automatically be added to the normal order forecast to produce a composite forecast.

Various enquiry and reporting features are available to enable you to get the most advantage from the forecasting process.