Inventory Reconciliation Outsourcing

What inventory reconciliation actually covers

Reconciliation is not a single workflow — it is a family of related data-hygiene workflows that each compare a "what the system says" view against a "what actually happened" view. The main ones we operate:

System-vs-physical reconciliation

Cycle count results, full physical results, blind count results — each generates variance against system inventory that needs investigation, root-cause classification, and posted adjustment. The reconciliation work is post-count: receiving the count tape or count sheet, comparing against system, finding the explanation for each variance, posting the correct adjustment.

Multi-warehouse reconciliation

Showroom counts, warehouse counts, in-transit counts, and online inventory each get touched by different teams in different systems. Weekly reconciliation aligns them so the consolidated picture is honest.

GL-vs-inventory reconciliation

The inventory dollar value in your ERP should equal the inventory asset line in your general ledger. When it does not, the cause is usually a posting gap somewhere — a write-off entered in one system but not the other, a return processed differently, a freight allocation mismatched. The reconciliation team finds and fixes these monthly.

Marketplace-vs-ERP reconciliation

For retailers selling on Wayfair, Amazon, Walmart, eBay, or Shopify, the marketplace platform has its own inventory state. Daily reconciliation makes sure that what each channel believes it can sell matches the actual available inventory in the ERP.

Vendor PO reconciliation

Vendor invoices reconciled against POs and receipt records — catching short-shipments, double-billings, and freight discrepancies before they get paid.

Why reconciliation work travels offshore well

Reconciliation is one of the highest-fit functions for offshore outsourcing because the work is:

• Document-driven — count sheets, vendor invoices, marketplace exports, ERP reports. All of it lives in files or screens, not in physical space.
• Rule-based with clear escalation criteria — most variances fall into a few categories with documented handling. Ambiguous ones get escalated to the in-house team.
• Asynchronous — work fits cleanly into overnight or weekly batches. There is no real-time pressure that requires same-second response.
• Detail-intensive — and detail-intensive work is exactly where focused offshore teams with SOPs outperform stretched in-house teams.
• Cyclic — weekly, monthly, quarterly cadences map well to scheduled offshore operations.

Our reconciliation cadence

• Daily — exception processing (transfer mismatches, urgent variances, marketplace stock-out reconciliations).
• Weekly — multi-warehouse position reconciliation, cycle count results processing.
• Bi-weekly — vendor invoice reconciliation against POs and receipts.
• Monthly — GL-vs-inventory reconciliation with documented variance explanation.
• Quarterly — full inventory data quality audit with operational recommendations to reduce future drift.

KPIs we report against

• Variance investigation completion rate — percentage of variances investigated and resolved within target window.
• Variance value resolution — dollar value of variance explained vs unexplained.
• GL-to-inventory match — month-end variance between GL inventory and ERP inventory.
• Reconciliation lag — average time from physical event to system entry.
• Recurrent root-cause categories — trends across variance categories so the upstream process can be fixed.

How we onboard an inventory reconciliation engagement

1. Discovery call (60 min, free) — current reconciliation cadence, ERP, pain points.
2. Paid 2-week pilot — usually one slice (e.g., weekly multi-warehouse reconciliation or monthly GL reconciliation) to demonstrate fit.
3. Pilot review — variance resolution rate, accuracy, and operational improvement suggestions.
4. Steady-state retainer — typically 40 to 160 hours per month depending on volume and location count.
5. Weekly KPI reporting, monthly operations retro, quarterly business review.

Related services we run