If you’ve built Procedure Bundles using the Procedure Cost Estimator tool, they will be available on every new procedure using the Use A Procedure Bundle button:

Clicking this button will show you a list of the bundles you’ve created with a button to Apply Bundle to the current procedure. Once you click the Apply Bundle button, you will select the appropriate inventory items based on lot number and expiration date of the actual item used in the procedure by clicking the plus sign next to the item shown in the list of all items of each type currently available in inventory.

You can also go to your saved Procedure Bundles and add bundles as favorites (click on the heart next to the bundle) so those procedure bundles appear as shortcuts above the search/scan box, making it easy to add your procedure bundle right from the Add/Edit procedure screen.

We have made it even easier to create Procedure Bundles during the Add Procedure process. Once you add the procedure and scan all of the inventory and resource items used in the procedure you can create a bundle from here. If this procedure is one you plan to do in the future and all or most of the items will be used in future procedures, you can click on the Create Procedure Bundle button, make any additional changes, give the bundle a name and save it for future use. This will simplify the process of adding procedures in the future by making it easier to add inventory items and resources in a just a few simple clicks.

It’s critical to understand the direction data moves using the Inventory Import tool: When you choose to copy inventory or inventory data it moves FROM the facility where you are currently working and moves TO the facility(ies) you select. Therefore, it is critical to ensure you are logged into the facility that has the data you want to copy and that all of your data is accurate. Choosing to copy data will overwrite all data at the destination facility and it cannot be recovered.

The import will only update matching items in the destination facility. For instance, if you copy pars or prices from facility A to facility B, only those items at facility B that match items in inventory at facility A will be updated. You can also extend this feature further by using the “Copy all items” option which will copy all items and all attributes to another facility. This is particularly useful for groups setting up new facilities and needing to fill the new facility’s inventory based off another location. This will copy all inventory types from the current facility to the destination facility, along with all par levels, prices and consignment status.

To launch the Item Price manager, go to the desired item and view it in Edit mode. Clicking the Contract Price will launch the tool automatically. You’ll be presented with numerous options for how you want a price change to be implemented. You can now update just items from certain old orders, you can update all old items, you can update future items only, etc.

You can also update just item prices on a particular PO and just Update the Prices that are attached to a particular PO number. **(If you are part of a Group and items have been transferred between facilities, you will need to update the price of the item using the PO where the item was initially added to inventory at the original facility, which will in turn update it through the life of the item in AMSHub).

Spend some time reviewing each of the options before making changes. Please remember that changes to old item data will impact all of your old case costing, reporting and analytics data as well, so be very certain about making changes to the prices of items in the past.

Updating Item Instances With No Price

For facilities that begin managing and using Inventory items before they get their item pricing in place, you can update item pricing on used items or items still on shelves that still have no price set. This is a powerful feature that can update months or years worth of data with a few clicks. Because of the potential breadth of changes using this feature, access is limited to only Facility, Site, or Tech Admin users. If your facility needs to be able to update items currently in inventory, or items that have already been used, that have no current price set, you can go to Inventory > Edit All, and click the red $ button next to the Price column header. This will open the confirmation popup window that restates what will be done if you choose to have AMSHub complete this action. It’s imperative to read through the information provided and understand exactly what AMSHub will do. This action cannot be undone and every item in your current or past inventory that has no price or a price of $0 will be updated to the current contract price for that item.

Bulk Price Editing

You can also bulk edit inventory item prices, but this should only be used when you need to change current contract prices for items and only want that price change to affect just new items ordered and received. Access this feature from main Inventory > Edit All.

**Please use extreme caution when editing item prices – particularly the prices of items used in the past – as this can have far-reaching implications for Reports and Analytics.

Creating Kits

The first step is creating the kit/case agreement details in AMSHub. Go to Tools > Kit Builder and add a new kit. Select the vendor, enter a name and the kit cost. Next you’ll add a collection of Kit Items, which will hold one or more specific items that are noted in the agreement you’ve made with your vendor. For instance, you may have a contract with Abbott that includes Armada catheters. So you would create a Kit Item called Armada Catheters (or any name you’d like for easy reference) and then you’ll add all Armada catheters that qualify towards the quantity of Armada usage relative to your kit price agreement. Perhaps it’s all 014 or 018 sizes. You’ll click the Add Products button to search your inventory and check the box for each item that will qualify towards Armada usage in your kit. You’ll repeat this for each item in your kit by providing a Kit Item name, adding all specific items, and provide the quantity.

If you have multiple facilities using AMSHub, you can share Kits you’ve created with other facilities so they don’t have to be recreated. Use the share button, select the other facilities in your group, and AMSHub will copy the Kit details to the other facilities for use and tracking. Should you need to update a kit, make changes at one facility and share to the others to update them with any changes.

To use bulk purchase, expand the Order Options panel on the final step of order creation and select the Bulk Order option. Enter the Bulk Price in the order detail area and Submit the order. Please note that the bulk purchase option is by Vendor, so only include items from this vendor in the order that are part of your bulk purchase. As a general rule, we recommend you create one order specifically for a bulk purchase agreement with only the item(s) included in the bulk purchase.

The solution is to review the information about this item type in AMSHub and either correct the incorrect data if the item is listed, or to add the item so that it is in inventory and can then be scanned out. Go to the main Inventory page and scan the item’s barcode. If the general item type doesn’t exist in your inventory you’ll get a message from AMSHub to that effect. In most cases it probably will show up in the search results and you can click the item to look at its details. At the bottom of the page you’ll see a list of the specific items in inventory of that type along with their lot numbers and expiration dates. You can look at that data and match what’s in AMSHub to the item’s label. If there is an item with very similar data but with perhaps one character different, it’s possible it was manually entered incorrectly and you can use the Edit feature to modify the item’s details. If it doesn’t appear to be in inventory at all, you’ll have to add the item. Once that item’s data (lot number and expiration date) are in the system, it can be scanned out.

When sales tax is enabled by entering a value into your Facility Settings that’s greater than 0, AMSHub will prompt you to choose whether you want to update item costs to include sales tax going forward, or if you’d like to update all items, including all old, existing, used, etc. If you choose “New Orders Only” all future item costs will include sales tax throughout the entire AMSHub platform. If you choose “New and Old Orders”, the system will go back through the entire history of your facility and update all item prices since you started to include sales tax on item costs.

Let’s look at an example: you have an item that costs $100. You set your sales tax to 7%. Throughout the entire AMSHub system, the item cost will appear as $107. If you chose to only have sales tax apply to new orders, and you’ve had these items in your inventory in the past, you would have some that appear as $100 and all new ones would appear as $107.

To implement sales tax you must have a role that is able to modify facility settings. Go to your user icon at the top menu, click to expand the sub-menu and select Facility Settings. You’ll see the Sales Tax % field where you can input your sales tax rate (please verify your tax rate prior to entering this figure). After adding or changing this value you will see some information appear regarding sales tax and two options on how to apply your sales tax: New Orders or New and Old Orders. Selecting new orders only makes sense if you’ve been using sales tax and are simply updating your tax rate to reflect a change. If you’ve never used the sales tax feature and want AMSHub to apply sales tax retroactively to all of your old items and their respective reports and analyses, select old and new orders.

In AMSHub Lite, inventory is reduced using the Scan Out feature. Each item that is used in a case should have its barcode scanned on the Scan Out page to remove it from the virtual inventory in AMSHub. If an item has no barcode or the barcode is unreadable/unusable you can manually enter the item details. AMSHub will match up the data provided in either scenario and remove the item from inventory.

There are a few steps involved in this process and we’ve outlined them below to help walk you through the process.

How To Import Existing Inventory

Since you’ll be scanning all of your disposables that could be located in multiple areas, we suggest you come up with an organized strategy for how you’ll work your way through your facility to scan everything in an orderly fashion. This will ensure nothing gets missed along the way and also provide you with enough structure to continue the import if you get interrupted for some reason.

Once you’ve got your strategy, you’re ready to get started:

Step 1 – Access Import Tool in AMSHub

You can start the import process by following the link from your Setup Checklist, or by going to Inventory and selecting the Barcode Import button.

Step 2 – Scan Items

When the Barcode Import tool loads, it’s ready to accept scanned barcodes.

Using a laptop or tablet connected to your barcode scanner and with the Import Tool loaded, begin scanning the barcodes of your items. We recommend the use of a laptop for simplest operation, but you can also use a tablet or a wireless scanner. Instructions provided here are for the recommended option of scanning with a laptop:

First, double-check your scanner for a few key features: ensure your scanner is adding a carriage return after each scan; ensure QR code scanning is enabled. See your scanner documentation for instruction on checking/enabling these features. You can also test your scanner by using the Scanner Test feature in AMSHub. Click on Help at the top of your screen, when logged in to AMSHub. Click on Scanner Test at the bottom of the drop down and follow the prompts on that page.

When you scan each barcode you’ll hear an audible sound from AMSHub providing feedback of the scan and the barcode content (you may also hear a beep from your actual barcode scanner which is not relevant beyond letting you know it read a barcode). AMSHub’s audible feedback tones will either be a double-beep success sound, or a buzz indicating there was an issue with the barcode data. If you hear the success sound, you can immediately scan the next barcode. Should you encounter the buzz tone, look at the screen in AMSHub as it will provide information to attempt at helping resolve the issue or alerting you that the item’s barcode is unusable. In some cases you’ll be prompted to scan another barcode, so follow the instructions as needed.

During this scanning process, AMSHub is testing each barcode to see if it has an acceptable format. If it does, it will get added to the import queue visible on the page. If the barcode format isn’t acceptable you’ll hear the buzz and follow the instructions, as noted above.

NOTES ON SCANNING:

For items that are in unopened boxes, scanning the box will add all of the items inside the box to your inventory automatically. For instance, scanning a box containing 10 items will add all 10 items to inventory with the single scan. If you have a box that’s been opened, we recommend scanning all of the individual items inside the box in case items have been replaced in the box with others from other Lots or with alternate Expiration Dates, or in case some items have been used and there are fewer items than were originally included in the box.

Take a minute to educate yourself on some basic barcode details. Spending a few minutes of time learning more about what you’re scanning will potentially save you hours of future time with scanning.

Step 3 – Import

Once you’ve completed the scanning of all items, you can use the Import button at the bottom of the page to engage AMSHub’s Import engine. This process will start work on processing all of the item data received, working to identify and classify your items, and place them into your inventory in AMSHub for use. When the Import process is complete you will get a report outlining successful imports and indicating any potential issues.

For items we’ve successfully imported, some will go directly into your inventory. Others may go into a pending status while our team works to ensure the data is complete and accurate, and will automatically update in your inventory once it has been verified.

AMSHub automatically saves your progress. Should you get disconnected from your network, get called away for other business, returning to the import process will pick up where you left off. We recommend you continue to scan items until complete and not rely on this however.

Step 4 – Define Item Attributes

Once items have been added to AMSHub, you can now use the main Inventory page to quickly update each item’s attributes. These include high and low par, price and consignment status. It’s very important to set par and price information specifically. This data is used immediately to automatically generate orders, and to analyze profitability, case costing and much more. You can bulk edit price and par levels using the Edit All feature provided on the Inventory List page: click Edit All, make changes to all items, and click Done to save your changes. To edit consignment status, go into the specific item and edit it to select the consignment checkbox and Update.

Alternate Inventory Import Option (Old Version)

This process was dramatically improved and replaced with the development of our new Import Tool within AMSHub. We strongly encourage you to use it using the process above. If for some reason that isn’t possible, you can follow the modified version of the old process listed here.

Step 1 – Scan Items

For this first step you’ll use a laptop or tablet along with your barcode scanner to capture the barcode data for your existing items. We recommend the use of a laptop for simplest operation, but you can also use a tablet or a wireless scanner with built-in memory. Instructions provided here are for the recommended option of scanning with a laptop:

First, double-check your scanner for a few key features: ensure your scanner is adding a carriage return after each scan; ensure QR code scanning is enabled (see your scanner documentation for instruction on checking/enabling these features).

Open Notepad or another basic text editing program on your computer.

Scan the barcode of each item and ensure a string of numbers (and potentially letters) are added to the text file. Each scan should result in one line being added and your cursor automatically going to the next line. You will have one line per item in the text file

Please review our Barcodes 101 page to learn more about the structure of barcodes so you can quickly determine if you’re scanning the correct barcode. For valid barcode data, your file will look something like this:

Each of those lines represents one item scanned, so this file is showing two different items that have been scanned from your shelves to be imported. There are a few unique vendors that in some cases use two barcodes to capture all of the product information normally included in one barcode.  For more information about this and other barcode details, again, please see our Barcodes 101 page.

Save the file periodically throughout this exercise.

Step 2 – Upload

This feature is no longer available with the release of the new Import Tool. If you’ve created a file for import please email it to support@archermedicalsystems.com along with your facility name, and your request to have the inventory data imported manually.

Login to AMSHub and select Setup Checklist from left navigation. Go to Task 7 and click the Import Inventory Now button.

Click the Select Barcodes File… button and navigate to the text file created in Step 1

The import feature will analyze the content of your file to check for validity of the file itself and the data inside the file. All compatible data will be imported into your account. Where there are formatting issues AMSHub’s tools cannot understand, AMSHub will report back with issues and provide basic guidance to assist with resolution.

Step 3 – Resolve Issues

There is a tremendous amount of logic built into the AMSHub inventory import tool that will attempt numerous ways to import the data you have provided. In some cases, there could be data in the file you upload that we simply cannot understand. This could be due to a number of factors such as scanning a barcode that contains bad data, a vendor who has non-compliant barcodes, etc. The Import tool will alert you to items we aren’t able to import and provide as much information as we can as to the reason. You can download the data the system was unable to import and clean it up and re-import the items with issues in an attempt to get the remaining products into the system.

For items we’ve successfully imported, some will go directly into your inventory. Others may go into a pending status while our team works to ensure the data is complete and accurate, and will automatically update in your inventory once it has been verified.

Step 4 – Define Item Attributes

Once items have been added to AMSHub, you can now use the main Inventory page to quickly update each item’s attributes. These include high and low par, price and consignment status. It’s important to set par and price information specifically. You can bulk edit this information using the Edit All feature provided on the Inventory List page: click Edit All, make changes to all items, and click Done to save your changes.

Please note that the Import feature is only available for use to load existing inventory to get your facility started on AMSHub. Once you begin using AMSHub to manage your facility by generating orders and adding procedures, this feature will no longer be available.

By default the inventory is sorted by Item Number (GTIN), but clicking the column headers will resort the data by each column respectively. You can filter the list by typing an item number or reference number into the search box, or by simply scanning the barcode of an item. You can also narrow your search by using the owned or consigned tabs. Clicking the item number, will take you to that item’s details.

When you hover over the icons to the right of each item you will see hint text informing you of the actions available: full edit, quick edit or delete. Full edit will take you to the edit page so you can make changes to all available item details. Quick edit allows you to make inline changes to the par levels for a particular item, while staying on the page. You can also completely Delete the item from your facility’s inventory.

The Edit All button, is a great feature if you want to make changes to par levels, price or consignment status, as it allows you to edit multiple items at once and save all your changes in one transaction. Click the button, make any changes you’d like, then click the Done button to save.

You can also add an item to your facility’s inventory from the AMSHub global catalog on this page, by using the Add Item button (red +) on the upper right side of the page. Learn more about adding items.  Alongside the add item button you will also see other icons that can be used to easily access other features regarding inventory.

You may have an extensive number of items in your inventory, although they are not all being used on a regular basis and you may have set the par levels for these items to 0. Instead of cluttering your inventory list with those items they are hidden by default along with inactive items. To view, check the show inactive checkbox. When you search inventory for an item, active items will show first and checking this box will let you see inactive or zero par items that also match.