Made for the goods that travel by van.

Water

Every bottle out is a bottle owed back.

Water routes are cash vans with high call counts and a second currency: the 19-litre bottle. Ibex Van Sales tracks containers as stock and as a balance on every customer, so the bottles are reconciled as carefully as the cash.

• Each invoice line of bottled water moves the right number of empty containers to the customer's balance
• Empties collected at a visit, with or without a sale, go back on the van
• Deposits charged per container and refunded by credit note when bottles come back
• Container balance on the customer card and on the printed invoice
• Empties checked at settlement; a missing crate or bottle is a variance like any other

Empties and deposits arrive in the second release; cash-van selling, collections and settlement in the first.

Dairy

Short shelf lives, counted by batch.

Milk, yoghurt and cheese go out fresh and come back close to their dates. Batches and expiry dates are part of the product, on the van and in every count.

• Van stock by product and batch, with expiry dates
• Returns marked good, damaged or expired; expired goods can never be resold from the van
• Damaged and expired returns go to quarantine or the damaged store at unload, not back to the shelf
• Near-expiry and expiry reports for the depot
• Crates and trays tracked as empties

Bakery

Daily routes, daily returns, every reason recorded.

Bread runs on a daily cycle: deliver this morning, take back yesterday's. Returns are a normal part of the business, which is exactly why they need reasons and limits.

• Suggested load from the route's last four same-weekday sales, so Friday's load is not Monday's
• Every return carries a reason and a condition; returns above a role's limit need approval
• Returns reported by product, route and reason, to spot an outlet or a salesman out of line
• Bread crates tracked per shop as empties

Beverages

Excise, schemes and coolers, handled.

Soft drinks, juices and energy drinks carry excise in much of the Gulf, move on trade schemes, and often sit in a cooler the distributor owns.

• Excise inside the price, with a sugar band on each drink so the excise share is right
• Buy-X-get-Y, slab and value promotions applied on the phone, with free goods taken from the van
• Promotion budgets that pause the scheme when spent, and claim files for the brand
• Crates and returnable bottles as empties
• Coolers placed at outlets, checked on visits with a photo and serial scan

Promotions and empties arrive in the second release; coolers at outlets in the third.

FMCG

Book today, deliver tomorrow, check the shelf.

Snacks, personal care and household goods are often sold by an order booker and delivered next day, with merchandising on the bigger accounts. One distributor may run all of that alongside cash vans.

• Order booking with the same prices, promotions and tax as an invoice
• Approval, allocation to delivery routes and partial deliveries with reasons
• Units by carton, pack and piece, with barcodes
• Surveys, shelf audits, competitor prices and photos
• A read-only portal where a brand sees its own secondary sales

Pre-sales and delivery arrive in the second release; merchandising and the brand portal in the third.

Tobacco

High value per carton, so every carton is counted.

Cigarettes carry a lot of value in a small box, which makes leakage expensive. The full chain of stock controls applies from the first release.

• Approved loads and a joint count signed by the storekeeper and the salesman
• Sales only from stock on the van; product-by-product reconciliation every night
• Unbroken number series per device; voids need approval and keep the original
• Excise inside the price in the Gulf; in Pakistan, tax on the printed retail price for Third Schedule goods
• Cash-only routes that cannot issue credit