Inventory policies

Configure inventory-wide stock unit, SKU, and barcode policy defaults for your account.

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Use Settings → Inventory policies to configure inventory-wide stock unit, SKU (Stock Keeping Unit), and barcode policy defaults. These defaults shape how new stock records start, how they are validated, and how warehouse labels are produced, so the whole account stays consistent.

Policies

  • Stock unit defaults: the base unit new stock items start with. Each item can still override purchase and sales/listing units after creation.
  • SKU policy: pattern-validation defaults for SKUs, with optional stock-group overrides. For the full detail, see SKU policy.
  • Barcode policy: control the internal barcode prefix and sequence, use Code 128 for warehouse labels, and choose whether manufacturer barcodes are optional, recommended, or required.

Why it matters

Consistent units, SKUs, and barcodes make every downstream step more reliable — listing templates, warehouse scanning, purchasing, costing, and channel publishing all depend on clean, predictable defaults.

Stock unit defaults

The stock unit default controls the base unit of measure selected when a new stock item is created. ChannelWeave seeds common units for your account such as Each (EA), Pack (PK), and Case (CS) automatically.

Custom units entered here or typed on a stock item are saved to the same account lookup and can be reused on later stock items.

Barcode policy

The barcode policy controls the internal warehouse barcode sequence:

  • Internal barcode prefix: the text before the running number.
  • Sequence width: how many digits are used in generated labels.
  • Internal label symbology: the barcode format used for warehouse labels.
  • Manufacturer barcode rule: whether supplier/on-item barcodes are optional, recommended, or required.

Warehouse scanning checks the internal barcode first, manufacturer barcode second, then SKU as the manual fallback.

Rollout tips

  • Set the unit default and policies before creating a large number of stock items.
  • Use Warn-style checks while cleaning historic data.
  • Print and test a small batch of labels before relabelling a whole warehouse.
  • Keep stock-group SKU overrides for genuine exceptions, not every product family.