Inventory operations where every stock discrepancy is investigated, moved and approved — not just recounted

Mi Retail is an operations center that manages the human work around your inventory and warehouse systems. The WMS or ERP keeps stock by location, lots, transfers and counts; Mi Retail handles what happens when one of those records needs a person — a count that does not match, a transfer stuck between sites, a receipt that arrives short, an adjustment that needs approval. Each situation becomes an Operational Work Item with an owner, a state, a due date and evidence, and it travels between counters, warehouse leads, transport and inventory control until it is resolved. The team sees what is being investigated and why, instead of reconstructing it from spreadsheets.

No. Your WMS or ERP inventory module stays the system of record for stock quantities, locations, lots, serials and transfer orders, and Mi Retail never keeps a second stock ledger. Mi Retail covers what the inventory system was not built for: coordinating the people who must act when the record and the shelf disagree. The WMS can tell you there is a variance of 48 units; Mi Retail manages who investigates it, which warehouse moves the stock, what the receipt is waiting for and who approves the correction with which evidence. When the adjustment is approved, the inventory system records it. Keep your WMS; Mi Retail takes over where the work leaves it.

The counter records the variance as a finding with count sheets and bin photos, and inventory control opens an exception that holds the investigation. When the cause is found — for example, a pallet put away at the wrong site — child work items go to the people who hold each piece: the sending warehouse picks and stages the transfer, transport moves it, and the receiving warehouse confirms quantity and lot. Each child has its own owner and state, and a blocked item carries its reason, such as a damaged lot label. When the pieces are in, the controller approves the adjustment with the evidence attached, and the inventory system records it.

An adjustment is an approval work item in the queue of whoever your organization designates — an inventory controller, a site manager or finance for larger write-offs — with the counts, the investigation notes, the transfer and the receipt attached. The approver decides from the work item and the reason is recorded. If the adjustment exceeds that person’s authority, it can be escalated to the next level with the same context instead of a forwarded email. Every decision keeps who approved, when and on which evidence, so at year-end or during a physical inventory audit you can show exactly why each number changed.

A transfer is not one handoff but three: someone has to pick and stage it, someone has to move it and someone has to receive it. In Mi Retail each leg is a work item with its own owner and due time, linked to the transfer order in the inventory system. The receiving warehouse knows what is coming and when, transport closes its leg with the signed delivery note, and if receiving finds a shortage or a damaged label, the work item is blocked with that reason and the sending site sees it immediately. Stock in transit always has someone responsible for it until the receipt is confirmed.

Each role gets its own surface on the same operation. A counter sees in My Work the counts assigned for the day and the findings to document. A warehouse lead works from Team Operations, where transfers to prepare, receipts pending and blocked items are ordered by due time and can be reassigned between people or shifts. An inventory controller sees the variances under investigation and the adjustments waiting for approval, each with its evidence. A supply chain manager sees accuracy risks by site in Operational Portfolio. People who only take part occasionally, such as a store receiving a transfer, need no training in the WMS.

Yes. Any inventory situation that needs a person to act can become a work item. A receipt that arrives short opens an exception with the delivery note and photos, linked to the purchase order, so purchasing can claim it from the supplier. Damaged stock becomes a review with a disposition decision — rework, return or write-off — and its approval. A stockout at a site can trigger a replenishment request or an urgent transfer from another warehouse, with the reservations that depend on it visible. The inventory system keeps the quantities; Mi Retail makes sure every exception ends with a decision and evidence.

Yes, when they have their own organization on Mi Retail. A request to an outside carrier, a third-party logistics provider running one of your warehouses or a supplier who shipped short can be sent as a derived work item that lands in their own queue. You follow its state, due time and result without seeing their internal work, and your exception closes when theirs does. Inside your own company, transport and every warehouse work from the same operation without needing another organization. Either way, the exchange stops depending on emails and phone calls that nobody can audit later.

A director does not need to follow every count. Operational Portfolio shows how each site and each inventory process is doing: open variances by age, transfers at risk, receipts blocked and adjustments waiting for approval. Executive Operations surfaces only what needs a decision at that level, such as a large write-off, a site whose counts keep failing or a recurring putaway error that points to a process problem. Each item carries its context and history, so the director can decide from Mi Retail without a meeting to reconstruct the facts, and the decision is recorded for the next review.

Yes. In a small operation the same person may count, receive and approve, and Mi Retail adapts to that: the experience collapses to the essentials, without approval chains or teams that do not exist, and every variance or short receipt is still a work item with a due date instead of a note. In a network with several warehouses, stores and carriers, the same work items move between counters, site leads, transport and inventory control, each with its own surface, and adjustments escalate by amount or site. What changes is how responsibilities are split, not the way the work is represented, so nothing has to be migrated as you grow.

The Supply Chain suite of StoneOS brings apps for the domain work of inventory and fulfillment — inventory, warehouses, lots and serials, reservations, transfers, replenishment, demand planning, fulfillment, shipping and inventory counts — on top of the Business Core apps every team uses, such as Sheets, Drive, Chat, To-do and Docs. Those apps keep the depth of each domain. Mi Retail is where the work they generate meets the people who must act on it: a count variance, a transfer that arrives short or an adjustment above a threshold lands as a work item in the right person’s queue. If you keep your current WMS, it stays the record.

Start with the exception that costs the most follow-up — usually count variances or transfers between sites — instead of modeling the whole supply chain. Create an inventory control workspace, invite the counters, the leads of the warehouses involved and whoever approves adjustments, and open the next variances as work items instead of recounts. After a few weeks you will know which sites drift, where transfers wait and which adjustments lack evidence. Then add receiving and replenishment, connect the WMS or inventory system you already use and, if it fits, bring in the Supply Chain suite apps from StoneOS. Mi Retail is free to start.