User guide

Supply Planner reads the weekly factory forecast workbook in your browser and shows which products the supply plan does not cover, what to order and what to move. Nothing is uploaded anywhere — the file stays on your computer.

Uploading the weekly workbook

• Drag this week's .xlsx onto the Upload page, or choose it from your computer.
• The app reads the run date, the week number and every factory tab it recognises.
• Check the data-quality summary: issues that change the answer, issues worth fixing, and notes.

A sheet counts as a factory tab when row 2 contains Model number, TRIGGER and a 12-M SO (or 6 MONTH SO) column. The factory name is the tab name without any -Closed suffix. Closed and stale factories are off by default and can be switched on with the chips on the Overview.

Your last file, settings, decisions and order changes are remembered on this computer. Uploading a new file discards all order changes and starts again from the orders in that file; a file with a new week number becomes the current week and the old one is kept for the week-to-week comparison.

The pages

Each factory tab holds one row per product. A row is a planning row when it carries a TRIGGER value — usually the kit or base model. Rows underneath with a blank trigger are its variants. The planning row owns the plan; the variants roll up into it.

The hidden Reports tab holds the raw ERP pivots and is the preferred source of truth, because those pivots are keyed by variant part numbers while the factory tab shows only the parent. The app looks up the parent and all of its variants and adds them together.

The Reports setting controls this: always prefer the ERP tables, fill in what is missing (the default), or off. Whenever a figure is rebuilt, the product shows where it came from.

Data issues the app never ignores

• Inventory position missing in the source: the planning row has a trigger but no total, so the sheet's own gap equals the whole trigger and shows a false shortage. The position is rebuilt from the ERP tables and flagged; if it cannot be rebuilt, the product is not counted as short.
• The same product on more than one factory tab: shown once per active factory, never added together.
• Order schedule lookups returning a dash: rebuilt from the ERP schedule block and badged.
• The typed next-month quantity disagreeing with the schedule for that month.
• Min/Max typed into the sheet rather than calculated.
• Mislabelled month headers, missing week columns, or the live week column carrying last week's number.

Q means the calendar quarter of the workbook's run date. Every multiplier and rounding step below is editable in Settings.

Demand

average monthly demand = units shipped in the history window ÷ history months (12)

The band: minimum, target and maximum

Target is the trigger level — the stock the plan aims to hold.

target (trigger) = roundUp( average monthly demand × trigger multiplier[Q], rounding step )

minimum = MIN from the tab, otherwise roundUp( average monthly demand, rounding step )

maximum = MAX from the tab, otherwise roundUp( average monthly demand × FG multiplier[Q], rounding step )

The rounding step is 10 by default and 5 for FUTABA. Rounding is always upwards.

Stock position today

stock after backlog (IA) = factory stock + OES stock + in transit − customer backlog

Pending internal transfers are shown separately and only added when the setting is on.

covered supply = stock after backlog + next month's receipts

Next month's receipts come either from the typed next-month quantity (the default) or from the order schedule for that month; both are shown side by side so a disagreement is visible.

gap = target − covered supply (a positive gap is a shortage)

months of cover = covered supply ÷ average monthly demand

shortage value = max(0, gap) × standard cost

excess value = max(0, covered supply − maximum) × standard cost

The 12-month projection

Month 0 is the run month and is left flat — no receipts and no demand — because part of it has already happened. From month 1 onwards:

closing[m] = closing[m−1] + receipts[m] − demand[m]

demand[m] = average monthly demand + max(0, dated backlog in month m − average monthly demand)

Only real open-order quantities count as receipts. Placeholder months are shown separately as "suggested" and excluded unless switched on in Settings.

Short now and Below minimum are only raised when the stock position is confirmed — present in the sheet or successfully rebuilt — so a missing total never produces a false shortage. Products are ranked by their worst flag, then by shortage value in dollars.

The traffic lights

• Red — action needed: any high-severity flag, a positive gap, or negative stock after backlog.
• Amber — marginal: any medium flag, covered supply below target, or a stockout inside the projection.
• Green — fine: none of the above.

This page works one product at a time. Pick a product from the search dropdown; products are listed worst first with a red, amber or green dot.

weekly demand = (average monthly demand × 12) ÷ 52

closing[w] = closing[w−1] + arriving[w] − weekly demand − dated backlog spread

Week 0 opens at stock after backlog. Existing factory orders land in the first week of their month (the run month is skipped, as in the monthly view). Dated backlog above the monthly average is spread evenly across the weeks of its month. An order you add arrives at the week it is placed plus its lead time. The chart shows minimum, target and maximum as a band; the horizon is 16 weeks by default.

Adding an order

suggested order = roundUp( maximum − lowest projected week, minimum order quantity )

The Units box is pre-filled with that suggestion; overwrite it freely. Choose the week to place the order in and the lead time (pre-filled with the product's standard lead time).

Changing what arrives

• Type over the Arriving figure in any week; quantities round up to the minimum order quantity.
• Weeks inside the lead time cannot be edited — that order would have had to be placed already.
• Drag the handle beside an arriving quantity onto another week to pull it in or push it out.
• Changed weeks turn amber and the factory orders table underneath follows the change.

Factory orders, week by week

placing week = arrival week − lead time

A read-only view of the same data from the factory's point of view. Lead time is editable per row and pre-filled per factory (10 weeks for FORTH, 8 for FUTABA). The lead time in a week may not be more than one week shorter than the week before it. Where the placing week falls before the current week it is greyed and the arriving quantity is locked.

For every product that needs supply — short now, below minimum, running out, or dropping below target — the app finds the first month in trouble and proposes changes in this order.

• Pull in. If a later month already has units on order, move them into the shortfall month first; only enough to reach the target, and at most from the next two months with stock on order.
• Increase or new order. Whatever is still missing becomes an order for the shortfall month.
• Push out. When stock stays above the maximum for three months in a row, the surplus at the start of that run is deferred, capped at what actually arrives that month.
• Cancel or review. Raised when there is stock on open order but nothing shipped in the history window, or the planner note contains "cancel".
• Fix data. One line per defect, naming the tab, row and column heading.

order quantity = roundUp( maximum − projected stock at the shortfall month, minimum order quantity )

If the factory's monthly capacity is a number and the order exceeds it, the order is split across consecutive months at capacity each. Each proposal can be Accepted, Modified (change quantity or month) or Rejected with a reason. The Adjustments page exports to Excel (one sheet per factory plus Data fixes), to CSV, and can copy the list as email text.

Start meeting takes a snapshot of where you are. Work through the products as normal. End meeting downloads an Excel file listing only the orders that actually changed — whether you accepted a proposal, edited one, or entered the change yourself. Rejected proposals are left out.

Each row records the product, factory, quantity before and after, the week the order must be placed, the week it arrives, the lead time used, and any note.

Resetting

• Reset changes on the Overview discards every order change and decision and returns to the orders in the uploaded file.
• Uploading a new workbook does the same automatically.