Task Items are Task-specific entities that appear as additional elements on the Task field.
Usually, items are used to denote delivery items contained within one Task. One delivery can have a multitude of items that you can keep track of both in terms of their state and proof of delivery. Items are most commonly used in case there are multiple packages meant to be delivered to the same location.
To add items go to Tasks ⇒ Task Profile ⇒ Items ⇒ Add Task Item
Define the item's name and click Save to apply changes. In case you use barcode scan for POD collection, here you can add the barcode for your items, which will be used for scanning via the Driver App.
Item size and quantity
It's also possible to define the size of the item in various ways. This isn't a mandatory step in setting up items, and if you don't wish to specify the size of each item, you may skip this step.
You can define:
quantity - how many units are contained within the item. For example, you have 2 books and 3 journals in one Task. 2 and 3 are the quantities of those items.
size - if you know it's full size, how much the item weighs in total. This means that if you specify 2 books and specify 2 kg as their size, this means that the 2 books weigh 2kgs together.
unit size - if you don't know the item's full size, just the size of each unit. Following the same example with 2 books, if you specify 2kg as their unit size, this means that each of the books weighs 2kg, and together they weigh 4kg.
Typically, the quantity option in combination with the Item size is used when one package within a Task contains multiples of the same unit and we know the overall size of the package and are not interested in the individual unit sizes (for example, a set of books for which we know the total weight of). In contrast, the quantity option in combination is used when the size of each item matters, as we don't know upfront how much the entire item will weigh in total (for example, a customer ordered a bunch of chairs, and we don't want to waste time calculating the total weight, so the system does that if we define the weight of one unit - the total will be calculated by multiplying the quantity with unit size).
Item PODs
To add PODs for Task Items go to Configuration ⇒ Task Actions IPOD) ⇒ Item actions.
You can add multiple PODs for both Pickup and Delivery actions. The POD actions you set up in Configuration are applied globally. However, you can override these settings on a Task or Customer level. This means that POD requirements changed for a specific Task individually, or to Tasks relating to specific Customers (defined in eLogii) will override the global POD settings from Configuration.
eLogii also gives you the option to apply Item actions to the entire Task when that Task has no Items associated with it. This means that POD actions for Items will be applied on the Task level if no Items are added. This workflow is especially useful if you usually have Item-related POD actions, however, there may be some instances where you might not have any items as a part of your Tasks. Adding custom Task POD actions for each instance could be time-consuming, so enabling the option to Apply item actions to Task when Task has no items would be a much faster way of doing this.
It is also possible to modify which PODs apply to each Task item individually by going to Tasks ⇒ Task Profile ⇒ Items ⇒ Item profile ⇒ Item actions
Keep in mind that these changes will apply only to Items for this specific Task, not all Tasks.
You can learn more about PODs by checking out this article.
💡 Pro tip - Undo Task Item Status Changes in case of a mistake
While there isn't an explicit undo option in eLogii, there is an easy workaround.
The Task containing the items needs to be returned to a non-final state (meaning it cannot be Failed or Completed). From your Dashboard you can navigate to the Task ⇒ items section ⇒ Click edit and select the task item ⇒ Click update > Save.
This should revert the Task Item state to the initial one.
Item CSV import
Like many other entities, items can be imported via CSV, as a part of Task import. An item is added in the same row as the Task it belongs to. Each task can have multiple items, so each item needs to be marked numerically so that eLogii knows which piece of information should be connected to which item.
Traditional Item import
The naming convention is items[0].description, items[1].description, items[2].description, and so on. The description here refers to the Name of the item, and the number in the brackets represents a different item. If you want to add the weight of each item for example (or any other set dimension), you can add it after items[0].description as a new column called items[0].size.dimension (e.g. items[0].size.weight).
Adding custom fields is done by defining the item you want to add a custom field for (let's say items[0], then it needs to be followed by CustomData.Field name. For example, items[0].CustomData.Item comment.
Importing quantities, unit size, and overall item size for each item is done by defining an additional column after the item[0].description column and titling it items[0].quantity, items[0].size.your defined capacity unit, and for the unit size items[0].unitSize.your defined capacity unit.
Item import based on shared property
eLogii allows users to import items based on a common denominator. This means that you can import Tasks that share the same address, postcode, reference, external ID, or anything else as a one Task with multiple items. This can be achieved though the Group Tasks on import feature which lets users select conditions based on which they wish to group Tasks as items.
For example, you can group Tasks with the same reference under one Task in which all the entities in the CSV file which share the same reference will be added as items. In terms of the naming conventions, any CSV fields use items[0].description as the row title if you wish for eLogii to pick up the desired fields for item names, and all the other fields' names should be following the Traditional Item import naming conventions. There is no need to add a column name for each item you wish to join into a Task if you're using this import approach. It's sufficient to use the items[0]. only once, and each item in the row that shares the same joining property will be regarded automatically as item 1, item 2, item 3 and so on.
Lastly, make sure to enable the Join items option after you select the Import tasks grouped by a certain fields as one task option and set up the joining condition.
You imported item sizes, but eLogii displays 0 as the total Task capacity
This is because you need to instruct eLogii to take a different approach to displaying and treating Task dimensions. By default, eLogii will display the size unit pertaining to the Task as a whole, and will not consider item sizes nor quantities. To override this, head to Configuration ⇒ Dimensions and select to sum the item size, or to multiply the item quantity with the defined item unit size (depending on your configuration.
Custom Fields for Items
Additionally, you can add Custom data for any Task Item, which can be done either through the Task Profile ⇒ Items ⇒ Custom data, or through Configuration ⇒ Custom fields ⇒ Task Items.
Adding custom fields from the Task profile
Adding custom fields through Configuration:
💡 Pro tip - Utilizing Custom Data for multiple Item Codes
While it is impossible to add 2 Codes to an Item, conventionally, you can still add any additional Codes by utilizing Custom data for each item.
However, in terms of scanning the Barcode, remember that only the code property on the item will be used for scans. For example, if you have a generated ABC code and decide to add XYZ code via Custom data, the ABC Product code/barcode will be used for scans.