Wave Release
There are three objectives when releasing waves:
• Create the picking tasks for staff in the picking area.
• Assign shipping lanes to a task that determine which items go where.
• Manage the picking throughput.
Batch picking or normal picking begins and staff can put all stock in shipping lanes only after you release the wave. Staff confirms the tasks for the wave through the RF device.
To manage throughput of large quantities, you can release orders on a wave incrementally. Or you can release all orders at once for smaller quantities.
You can implement wave releases as an iterative process. In theory, staff should complete replenishment for a wave before they start the release. However, if staff have not completed replenishment for a current wave and the picking of the previous wave is complete, staff can start picking for the current wave, even though all items are not yet replenished.
Further, if the replenishment is not complete for a wave, you can still release orders for which all order lines are replenished.