User Guide
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Master items & data

As your catalog and number of branches grow, two tools keep things consistent: master items give you a single company-wide list of products, and data templates let you add or update many items at once from a spreadsheet.

Access

Master items sit under the Items permission; data templates need the Inventory Data Template permission. Both live in the Manage section of the web sidebar.

Master items

A master item is a product defined once for the whole company — its name, barcode, description, packaging, and unit of measure. Individual branches then link their own stocked items to a master item, so "500ml Coke" means the same thing everywhere and you avoid duplicates and typos across locations.

1

Open Master Items

Web: Master Items in the sidebar (Manage section).

2

Create a master item

Enter the item name, an optional barcode (auto-generated if you leave it blank), a description, and its packaging — the quantity per piece, the UOM per piece, and its unit.

3

Link branches

See which branches stock the item, and link a branch's item to this master record to keep them in sync.

Note

Master items are about consistency across branches, not stock levels. Counts, costs, and purchases still belong to each branch's own item — the master record just ties those branch items to one shared definition.

Data templates — bulk import & export

When you're setting up a branch or making a lot of changes, entering items one at a time is slow. Data templates let you work in a spreadsheet and bring everything in at once.

Export your current items

1

Open Data Template

Web: Data Template in the sidebar (Manage section).

2

Export current stock

Export your existing items as a populated spreadsheet — handy as a backup, or as a starting point for bulk edits.

Import items from a spreadsheet

1

Download the blank template

Get the empty FCMS Inventory Data Template to fill in. You can include the unit-of-measure columns or leave them out.

2

Fill it in

Add a row per item. Columns are matched by their header, so the order of columns doesn't matter — just keep the header names intact.

3

Upload the file

Upload your filled template (.xlsx or .csv). FCMS reads it and prepares the items.

4

Review the import summary

After importing, FCMS shows what was created, what was skipped, and anything flagged for attention, so you can confirm the result before relying on it.

Tip

Any items with no purchase or transfer date are dated to the current month by default — you can set a different month at import time so opening stock lands in the right period.

Heads up

Import in small batches the first few times and check the summary. It's far easier to fix ten rows than to unpick a thousand, and the summary tells you exactly which rows need another look.

Next: Settings & account.