Inventory Commitments

Elevate plan

An inventory commitment records demand you expect on top of your normal sales: a wholesale customer’s order before they place it, a contract, a promotion, a tender. You list the products, how many you expect to need, when, and how likely it is. Once you confirm the commitment, the forecast counts those units as future demand, so your reorder dates and quantities make room for them.

What a commitment is

A commitment has:

A name and a plan number. Out of the box, plan numbers start with IC-, for example IC-00012. You can switch to your own format; see Plan numbers.
A target date: one day, or a date range. It’s when the demand happens, for every item that has no date of its own.
A default probability: how likely the demand is, from 0 to 100%. 100% means it’s certain.
Items: the products, each with an Estimated qty and a location (or Unallocated (all locations)), and optionally its own date and probability. The forecast counts each item’s Expected qty, the estimated quantity times the probability.
Demand type, reason and source: labels for your records, such as Promotion, Sales Commitment and Sales Team. They don’t change the forecast.
A recipient (optional): who the units are for.

Like every plan, a commitment starts in Draft and feeds the forecast while it’s Confirmed or Locked. See Plan statuses & lifecycle.

When to use one

A customer has announced a large order. Record it as soon as you know, with the probability you’d give it, and raise the probability as the deal firms up.
You’ve signed a contract for regular deliveries over a period. Use a date range so the demand is spread over it.
You’re running a promotion on specific products and expect extra sales.
You’ve bid on a tender and want to see what winning it would take, at a low probability.

When not to use one:

For a sales goal you hope to reach, use a sales plan. A sales plan never changes the forecast, so a target can’t make you overbuy.
For a holiday that comes back every year, such as Black Friday, use a promotional event. You set it up once, and it lifts the forecast every year.
For a product you haven’t sold yet, use New Product Planning. It gives the product a launch curve based on similar products.

The list

Open Inventory Planning and click the Inventory Commitments tile. The list shows every commitment with these columns:

Column	What it shows
Commitment	The name, with the plan number underneath. Click it to open the commitment. A commitment without a name shows “Unnamed commitment”.
Location(s)	The location of its items: one name, “Multiple (n)” for several, or ”-” when no item has a location.
Items	How many products it holds.
Total est. qty	The sum of the estimated quantities.
Expected qty	The sum of the expected quantities, after probability. This is what the forecast counts.
Status	The status badge, plus an amber Window elapsed badge when all its dates have passed but it’s still open. Point at the badge to see when the window ended and what to do.
Target date	The commitment’s date, for example “Dec 1, 2026”, or its date range.
Updated	When it last changed.

Click the Commitment, Status, Target date or Updated header to sort the list.

Each row’s … menu has View/Edit Details, and Delete for commitments in Draft, Completed or Cancelled. Delete asks first (“It will be removed from all views.”) and goes ahead with Delete Inventory Commitment.

Above the list you can search, filter and save filter sets; see Search, filters & saved views. Export downloads the commitments you ticked, the current page or every commitment matching your filters as a spreadsheet; see Exports, documents & activity.

The commitment page

Click a commitment to open it.

Header: the plan number as the title, the name under it, and when it was created. The status stepper sits at the top right.
Tabs: Items, Documents and Activity, the first two with a count, for example Items (3). On the same row, on the right: Edit details, the next-step button (such as Confirm) and the Actions menu.
Linked orders: once you’ve created orders from the commitment, slim bars at the top of the Items tab read Linked purchase order (Linked purchase orders once there are several), Linked transfer order or Linked sales order. Purchase and transfer orders are linked by their number; the sales order has an Open link. See Ordering from a commitment.
Details card: Name, Status, Default probability, Target date, Demand type, Reason, Source and Items, then Notes and Recipient. Next to the Details title, a badge shows whether the commitment feeds the forecast: Feeds forecast, Not feeding forecast or Excluded from forecast. Point at the badge, or move to it with the keyboard, for the reason. See Plans in the forecast.
Items table: the products, with their quantities, locations, dates and probabilities. See Items, dates & probability.

Most fields have a small info button next to their label. Point at it (or tap it) for a short explanation.

The Actions menu holds:

Edit details (while the commitment can be edited)
The other status moves, such as Back to Draft, Complete, Release or Cancel
Exclude from forecast or Include in forecast (while it’s Draft, Confirmed or Locked)
Create purchase order, Create transfer order, Create sales order. Once created, they become View purchase order (one per purchase order) with Create another purchase order, View transfer order and View sales order.
Quick PDF export and Export
Delete

Each entry has a one-line description of what it does. The status moves are explained on Plan statuses & lifecycle.

The Documents tab holds files you attach, such as the customer’s letter of intent. The Activity tab records every change and lets you add comments. An item edit says what changed, for example “Updated Mug · Blue at Berlin: estimated qty 100 → 120”. See Exports, documents & activity.

Editing details

Click Edit details to open the edit dialog (titled, for example, Edit IC-00012). It has the same fields as the create dialog: name, target date or date range, default probability, demand type, reason, source, notes and recipient. Change what you need and click Save changes.

Details can be edited while the commitment is Draft or Confirmed. Changing the default probability or the target date updates every item that doesn’t have its own. A Confirmed commitment must keep a target date: to remove it, move the commitment back to Draft first.

You can also edit Notes straight on the Details card: click the text, type, and click away to save.

Recipient

The Recipient (optional) section stores who the units are for: first and last name, email, phone, company and address. “Where these units go. Stored like a Shopify customer so a sales order can be prefilled later.” When you choose Create sales order, the Shopify draft order gets the recipient’s email and shipping address. Without a recipient, the Details card says “No recipient set.” See Ordering from a commitment.

What you can do here

Creating a commitment Create one by hand, or several at once from a spreadsheet.

Items, dates & probability Add products and set their quantities, locations, dates and likelihood.

Ordering from a commitment Create purchase orders, a transfer order or a Shopify draft order.

Plan statuses & lifecycle Confirm, lock, complete or cancel a commitment.