How to Run a Physical Stock Audit

However careful your receiving and issuing is, real-world stock drifts from what the system thinks you have — breakage, miscounts, spoilage and the occasional missing item all add up. A Physical Inventory (stock audit) is how you reconcile the two: you count each item at a location, Rentablez shows you the variance, and when you complete the audit it posts the stock adjustments automatically.

Why Run a Stock Audit?

Accuracy — bring on-hand quantities back in line with reality so reorder alerts and valuation reports can be trusted.
Accountability — every variance is captured with a reason code and note, and completing the audit writes a stock adjustment transaction you can trace later.
Honest counts — optional Blind Count Mode hides system quantities from counters so they record what they actually see, not what the screen expects.

Physical Inventory lives in the Store module and is gated by permissions. Anyone with stores.read can view audits; you need stores.write to start, edit, complete or cancel one.

Where to Find It

Open the Store and go to Inventory → Physical Inventory. You will see a list of past and in-progress audits with their Audit #, location, status, audit date, item count and notes. Click any row to open its detail page.

Step 1 — Start a New Audit

Click + New Audit. In the Start New Stock Audit panel, fill in:

Field	Notes
Store Location	Required. The location whose items you want to count. If your organisation has one location it is pre-selected.
Audit Date	Optional. Defaults to today if left blank.
Audit Notes	Optional. Purpose of the audit or instructions for the people counting.
Blind Count Mode	Optional toggle — see the next section.

Starting an audit snapshots the current system quantities for every item at that location. Items added after you start are not part of this audit, so count soon after you begin.

Click Start Audit. Rentablez creates the audit and opens its detail page, ready for counting.

Turn on Blind Count Mode when you want counters to record what they physically find without being influenced by the system figure. In a blind audit:

The System Qty and Variance columns are hidden while counting.
Counters see only item names and SKUs, plus a Notes column for physical observations.
System quantities and variances are revealed only after the audit is completed.

A Blind badge appears on the audit, and a banner reminds everyone that quantities are hidden.

Step 3 — Record Your Counts

On the audit detail page you get a metrics strip (Total Items, Counted, With Variance, Est. Value Impact) and a table of every item to count.

For each item, enter the quantity you physically counted in the Counted Qty column. As you type:

The item’s Status flips from Pending to Counted.
In a normal (non-blind) audit, the Variance column shows the difference against System Qty — negative in red for shortages, positive in green for surplus.
Your changes auto-save shortly after you stop typing; you can also click Save Counts at any time. An Unsaved marker appears until changes are stored.

Explaining a variance

Whenever a count differs from the system figure, a Reason Code dropdown appears for that row. Pick the one that fits:

Reason Code	Use it for
Damage / Breakage	Items broken or damaged beyond use
Expiry / Spoilage	Consumables past their usable life
Miscount	A previous counting or entry error
Transfer Error	Stock moved but not recorded correctly
Theft / Loss	Items missing or stolen
Other	Anything not covered above

Use the Notes field to add detail. (In blind mode the Notes field is always available so counters can jot down observations even before variances are known.)

Counting with a scanner

To speed up counting, click Scan Mode and point a QR/barcode scanner at each item’s Store label. Every scan increments that item’s counted quantity by one and flashes the row. Press Esc to leave scan mode.

Scan Mode reads the QR labels you print from the Store. See How to Print Item Labels and Bulk Import Items for printing those labels.

Step 4 — Review and Complete

When counting is done, click Complete Audit. A confirmation window summarises the impact before anything is posted:

How many items have a variance.
A per-item preview of variance, unit cost and value impact.
The Total Value Impact on your inventory valuation.

Confirm to finish. Rentablez then:

Sets the audit status to COMPLETED and records the completion time.
Generates a stock adjustment transaction for every item with a variance, bringing system quantities in line with your counts.
Reveals the system quantities and variances if the audit was blind.

Completing an audit changes stock levels and posts transactions that cannot be undone from here. Double-check unusual variances before you confirm.

Audit Statuses

Status	Meaning
DRAFT	Just created; counts can be entered and edited
IN PROGRESS	Counting is underway; still editable
COMPLETED	Counts locked in and adjustments posted
CANCELLED	Abandoned; no adjustments were made

Exporting and Cancelling

Export CSV — available on in-progress and completed audits, this downloads a variance report (item, SKU, UOM, system qty, counted qty, variance, reason code and notes) for record-keeping.
Cancel Audit — abandons the audit without posting any adjustments. Use this if the count was set up incorrectly. Cancelling cannot be undone.

A completed stock audit adjusts your Store items only. It does not touch rental asset units — moving those between hubs is a separate flow. See How to Transfer Stock Between Hubs.

What Is the Store Module?
How to Manage Store Items and Stock
How to Track Stock Transactions?
How to Read Store Reports (Valuation, Reorder, P&L, Consumption)
How to Print Item Labels and Bulk Import Items