Special routing in PULPO WMS follows a structured prioritization process to determine which stock should be picked first. Below you will find a breakdown of the process.
Basic routing model
The system begins calculating the route by identifying the zone with the highest priority as it is defined in the Warehouse Wizard.
In case no special routing is enabled, the system is looking for the position closest to packing based on the digital twin of your warehouse created in the Wizard.
Once all stock from the highest-priority zone has been processed, the system moves to the next zone and repeats the sorting process.
Special Consideration for Lots
If stock is managed in lots, the system always prioritizes the oldest lot within the warehouse.
If multiple stocks have the same lot, the standard zone and position priority sorting applies.
Priority-based special routing
In addition to the above, PULPO WMS has an option to adjust the picking route creation mechanism based on the zone and position prioritization criteria. Position prioritization must be enabled by PULPO WMS team for this functionality to become available.
Special routing prioritization criteria
When selecting stock for picking, the system follows this order of priority:
1. Suggested Batch – If the user decides for a certain serial or batch to pick, the stock is marked as a suggested batch and gets the highest priority.
2. Custom Filter Strategy – If a stock matches a specific custom strategy, it is prioritized next.
3. Expiration Date – Among the remaining options, the oldest expiration date is to be picked first.
4. Volume Consideration – Stocks from locations marked as non-volume are considered before others.
5. Zone Priority – The system then sorts by zone priority, picking from the highest priority zone first.
6. Location Priority – Within each zone, locations are sorted by their assigned priority.
Assigning priorities to the warehouse zones
Zone priorities are assigned in the Warehouse Wizard on creation of the warehouse zones. The priorities can be adjusted any time. The zone with the smaller priority value is picked first. In the example below, the Crossdocking Area will be picked before the Speicher zone, etc.
Assigning priorities to the warehouse locations
After enabling the position prioritization option, in the Positions menu point (1), a CSV file containing position priorities can be downloaded (2).
The file contains all the pickable warehouse positions, and their priorities (initially it is empty). Unlike the warehouse zones, the position with the higher priority value will be picked first within the related zone.
To adjust the route in the warehouse, download the file with priorities and assign the priorities to the positions descending from the 1st position to be picked.
After adjusting the priorities, you can upload (3) the CSV file to the system. The routing mechanism will immediately start considering new values.
Possible upload issues and troubleshooting
Some positions have the same priority.
Solution: make sure all the position priorities are unique, and try uploading the file again.
Some positions are missing priority.
Solution: add priorities to all the positions on the list and try uploading the file again.