What is a warehouse management system or WMS?
In other words, a WMS system can be defined as a program designed to manage all operational activities in a warehouse, information about which is centralized. Its main task is to maintain optimal inventory values, as well as collect all information about the movement of goods in the warehouse.
This ensures that your company has a record of every physical movement that occurs in your warehouse, which you can easily consult in the database, thereby preventing any confusion in goods and maintaining product traceability.
For any company, irrespective of the sector in which it operates, the warehouse is part of its backbone as large quantities of goods are collected in this premises and ignorance of what goes into it can lead to non-payments from customers as well as economic losses .
What are the functions of a warehouse management system?
The functions that a WMS system allows you to perform are very diverse, helping your company in various sections, including:
- With this software, you will be able to access each of the receipt orders that are pending as they are generated based on the number of orders that have been issued to the suppliers.
- You will be able to use an electronic invoice, with which you can enter the order you need and issue it to the supplier.
- The warehouse management system allows you to confirm the information on the invoice to avoid errors in the quantities received.
- It also allows you to receive products without a receipt order.
- You can control product traceability because it allows you to control the batch, series and expiration date of each item.
- You can implement quality control, allowing you to check dimensions, weight and even temperature.
- With WMS software, you can easily make returns related to a specific incoming order.
![]()
However, these are not the only functions that a warehouse management system performs, as it also helps you in managing the location and rotation of products between warehouses, inventory management, and the packing, picking and cross-docking process.
Other functions that can be performed using WMS include scheduling process, routing process, etc.
Advantages of a warehouse management system
Among the most significant advantages are the following:
- It has a great impact on reducing staff turnover and at the same time can increase the versatility of each operator.
- Each operator is more productive, and the activities performed are more reliable, as is your inventory.
- Planning your company becomes much more reliable and makes every decision easier.
- It allows you to reduce the number of administrative tasks, as well as reduce costs and reduce the amount of space used.
- It has a very big impact on customer satisfaction by reducing order fulfillment times.
- Finally, we can say that it can also reduce the number of returns and product shelf life, since products do not stagnate in the warehouse.
Remember that warehouse management systems or WMS can be completely independent or integrated into an ERP system, but no matter how they work, they can offer your company great advantages, elevating it above the competition.
