Work Orders

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Use Work Orders To Control Builds

Open Manufacturing, then Work Orders. The page can show a Kanban board or list view. Use search, status filters, type filters, and view controls to run daily queues such as draft work to release, released work to start, in-progress work to complete, and completed work to close.

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Understand The Status Flow

• Draft: planned work that has not been released to the floor.
• Released: approved to start. Released work contributes component demand to planning.
• In Progress: work has started and material or labor activity can be recorded.
• Completed: the planned quantity has been completed, or the completed quantity reached the planned quantity after a final partial completion.
• Closed: the completed work order is finalized for reporting and variance review.
• Cancelled: the work order is stopped and removed from active manufacturing demand.

Arcus enforces a controlled path. Draft can move to Released or Cancelled. Released can move to In Progress, Completed, or Cancelled. In Progress can move to Completed or Cancelled. Completed can move to Closed. Closed and Cancelled are terminal.

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Create A Work Order

1. Open Manufacturing.
2. Open Work Orders.
3. Click New Work Order.
4. Select an active BOM.
5. Enter the quantity to build, convert, or disassemble.
6. If the BOM requires a source serial, select an available serial number.
7. Choose the location, priority, planned start date, and due date.
8. Add notes when the floor team needs special instructions.
9. Choose whether to release immediately or keep the work order in draft.
10. Create the work order.

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Work The Detail Page

Open a work order to manage the actual shop-floor work. The header shows the work order number, status, priority, product, completed quantity, BOM name and revision, and location. Conversion and disassembly work orders can also show the source product or source serial context. The detail page has five operating tabs.

• Materials: issue, return, scrap, or substitute required lines. Conversion work splits this into Step 1: Remove from Source and Step 2: Add New Parts.
• Serials: review allocated source serials for conversion or disassembly and serials produced by completed builds.
• Labor: record hours, rate, description, and labor cost.
• Cost: compare estimated cost with actual material, labor, overhead, total, and cost per unit.
• Timeline: review release, start, material, labor, completion, close, cancellation, and serial events.

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Materials Tab

Use Issue on consume or add lines when material leaves available stock for the work order. Use Return on return-to-stock lines, and Scrap when recovered parts should be recorded as waste. Retain lines are informational and do not show an action button. Arcus shows required, issued, returned, or scrapped quantities, plus current component availability at the work order location. Use Substitute only before material is issued on that line. The substitute drawer compares the original component with the replacement, shows cost change, checks available stock, and asks for confirmation if the replacement is short or out of stock. Substitution is available only on Released or In Progress consume or add lines that have not already been issued and have not already been substituted. Material scenarios by work order type:

• Assembly: consume component lines and receive the finished product at completion.
• Conversion: remove or consume from the source, then add new parts before receiving the converted product.
• Disassembly: consume the source product, then return recovered components to stock or mark scrap and retain lines as designed by the BOM.

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Serials Tab

For conversions and disassemblies, the source serial is allocated when the work order is created. When the work order completes, a conversion source serial becomes consumed in manufacturing and a disassembly source serial becomes disassembled. For serialized assembly or conversion output products, the completion modal requires exactly one unique serial number per completed unit. If a lot number is entered for serialized output, the lot must already exist.

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Labor And Cost Tabs

Record labor while the work order is Released or In Progress. Labor entries add hours, rate, description, performed date, user context, and total labor cost. The Cost tab compares estimated cost to actual material, labor, overhead, total cost, and cost per unit so supervisors can explain the variance before close.

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Complete A Work Order

1. Open a Released or In Progress work order.
2. Review component stock and any manually issued materials.
3. Click Complete Build.
4. Enter the quantity to complete.
5. For serialized output, enter one unique serial number per completed unit.
6. For serialized output, optionally enter an existing lot number.
7. For disassembly, review the cost allocation preview when it appears.
8. Click Complete.
9. Review inventory, serials, cost, and timeline after completion.

Completion has important side effects:

• Arcus requires a location before completion.
• Arcus prechecks remaining component stock before it backflushes unissued consume or add lines.
• If stock is short, completion is blocked before partial inventory movement happens.
• Remaining required materials are backflushed at FIFO cost for the completed quantity.
• Assembly and conversion work receive finished goods into inventory at accumulated actual cost.
• Disassembly consumes the source product at FIFO cost and receives return-to-stock components using explicit allocation percentages when all returned lines have them. Otherwise Arcus auto-allocates by quantity and unit cost, with equal split as the fallback.
• Completed output can create FIFO layers for future shipments or adjustments.
• Manufacturing accounting activity can post material, labor, overhead, completion, and variance context.
• Dependent demand is recalculated after completion.
• Full completion moves the work order to Completed. Partial completion leaves the work order open for the remaining quantity.
• Disassembly does not produce the work order product as finished goods. It produces the recovered component lines instead.

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Close A Completed Work Order

Close only after the work is physically complete and the detail page has been reviewed. Closing finalizes the completed work order for reporting and records the estimated minus actual variance shown in manufacturing reports. Arcus uses actual FIFO cost behavior. WIP is transferred at completion, so close is a review and reporting step, not a shortcut for changing product cost or posting a standard cost variance adjustment.

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Cancel Work Safely

Cancel a Draft, Released, or In Progress work order when the work should not continue. Arcus asks for a reason so the timeline explains why the work stopped. Cancellation side effects:

• Issued consume or add materials are returned to stock.
• Material cost on the work order is cleared after reversal.
• An allocated source serial is released back to available when it has not already been consumed.
• Component demand is removed from MRP and reorder signals.
• The cancellation reason stays on the timeline.

Completed and Closed work orders cannot be cancelled. If physical work was completed incorrectly, review the inventory, serial, return, adjustment, or accounting workflow that matches the correction.

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Use Work Orders From Product And Order Context

Product detail can show recent work orders, build recipes, where-used rows, and a Build This Product action when the product has an active BOM. Order detail can also surface manufacturing eligibility for lines that should be built. When you start from those contexts, still verify the BOM, quantity, location, priority, and dates before creating the work order.

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Common Blocks

• No active BOMs appear: activate a BOM before creating the work order.
• Source serial is required: conversion and disassembly work may require an available serial from the source product.
• Cannot drag to a column: the target status is not allowed from the current status.
• Issue materials fails: check the work order location, component stock, line quantity, and whether the work order is Released or In Progress.
• Substitution warns about stock: receive more replacement stock before issue, or confirm only when the team intentionally accepts the shortage.
• Substitution is missing: check that the work order is Released or In Progress, the line is consume or add, nothing has been issued on that line, and the line is not already a substitution.
• Completion fails for stock: review component shortages, work order location, source serial status, and whether required materials can be issued.
• Completion fails for serials: enter exactly one unique output serial per completed serialized unit.
• Completion fails for lot: create the lot first, or leave the optional lot field blank.
• Disassembly completion fails: check source stock, returned component allocation percentages, and whether explicit allocation percentages sum to 100.
• Cancellation is unavailable: Completed and Closed work orders cannot be cancelled.
• Costs look unexpected: review BOM cost rollup, FIFO material issue, labor entries, overhead, substitutions, returned components, and completion quantity.

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