Printing a Day's Picking Lists and Fulfillments in One Go
Table of Contents
- 1. What This Scenario Is
- 2. How to Set It Up in the System
- 3. What Daily Operations Look Like
- 4. Boundaries and Related Features
1. What This Scenario Is
Warehouses that pick mainly on paper usually print the whole day's paperwork before the shift starts: pickers take the picking lists to the shelves, and the distribution or packing staff take the fulfillments and use the picking slot number on each one to sort goods into the right order. A day's picking lists are often spread across several waves. Printing from each wave page one at a time means many clicks when there are many waves, and the output ends up as several separate files you have to put in order yourself.
On the picking list list, select the picking lists you need and generate the whole batch of picking lists or fulfillments at once, across waves:
| Paper to print | Who uses it | Which download to use on the list |
|---|---|---|
| Picking list | Pickers, to pick from the shelves | Download Picking Lists |
| Fulfillment | Distribution / packing staff, to sort goods by picking slot number | Download Fulfillments |
2. How to Set It Up in the System
Quick links: Before the shift | Select today's picking lists | Choose what to print and how to package it | Get the files
2.1 Before the Shift
- Picking lists already exist: Batch download only prints existing picking lists; it does not create them. Create the day's picking lists first in Generate Picking List.
- Your account needs the Orders – Write permission: Without it, the two download options do not appear on the list. Contact your administrator to check your permissions.
2.2 Select Today's Picking Lists
Narrow the list with Search and Filters first, for example creation date set to today, picking mode set to Paper Picking, and status set to In Progress. In a multi-merchant warehouse you can also filter by merchant.
When the range is set and you need more than the current page, check the header checkbox and click "Select all records matching criteria" to select every picking list matching the filters. You can select up to 50,000 records at a time; see Batch Actions for details.
2.3 Choose What to Print and How to Package It
Both downloads offer "Merged PDF" and ZIP. First, be clear about the unit of each kind of paper:
| Picking list | Fulfillment | |
|---|---|---|
| Unit | One per picking list | One per wave: selecting one picking list means all fulfillments of its wave |
| Content | Each uses the same layout as the download from Picking List Detail, one after another; items are not totaled across picking lists | Generated with the Custom Templates bound to each order's channel |
| Several lists from the same wave selected | Each one printed separately | The wave (for example, several picking lists split by zone) is printed only once, with no duplicates |
| Work Order Picking picking lists | Included as usual | Skipped, with a notice of how many were skipped |
Then pick a packaging option based on how the paper will be handed out:
| Packaging | Best for | Output |
|---|---|---|
| Merged PDF | One team printing the whole stack at once | One PDF. Picking lists are ordered by creation time; fulfillments are ordered by wave first, then by picking slot number within the wave, so you can sort goods by the numbers on the paper without re-ordering |
| ZIP | Handing different waves or lists to different teams, or reprinting only some of them | Picking lists: one PDF per picking list, named after the picking list. Fulfillments: one PDF per wave, named after the wave |
When the selection spans multiple merchants, fulfillments can only be downloaded as ZIP; see 3.3 for why. Picking lists have no such restriction.
2.4 Get the Files
After choosing, open "Background Jobs" at the top right to check progress and download the file. Files are kept for about one day. To print again the next day, download again rather than reusing the previous day's link.
3. What Daily Operations Look Like
Quick links: How picking lists are ordered | How fulfillments are ordered | When the system blocks or skips | Large volumes
3.1 How Picking Lists Are Ordered
The picking list output is one picking list after another, each containing only that picking list's own items. If two picking lists contain the same product, it appears once in each; the system does not combine them into one line.
The merged PDF follows the order in which the picking lists were created, so reprinting the same batch gives the same order. Picking lists are always A4 and can be merged into one file even across merchants.
3.2 How Fulfillments Are Ordered
Fulfillments belong to waves, not to picking lists. The system maps the selected picking lists to their waves, removes duplicates, and prints the fulfillments of those waves:
- Merged PDF: Ordered by wave first (in order of wave creation), then by picking slot number from smallest to largest within each wave. Slot numbers are assigned per wave, so this ordering keeps the same number from two different waves from being interleaved.
- ZIP: One PDF per wave, also ordered by picking slot number within the wave. A wave with no fulfillments produces no file.
- Returned fulfillments are not printed: A fulfillment returned on Wave Detail no longer belongs to that wave, so later downloads do not include it.
Each fulfillment is generated with the Custom Templates bound to its order's channel. Whether the picking slot number appears on the paper, and where and how large, is decided by the template.
3.3 When the System Blocks or Skips
| Situation | What the system does | Why, and what to do |
|---|---|---|
| No picking list selected | Shows "Please select picking lists to download" or "Please select picking lists to download fulfillments for" and produces no file | Select picking lists first, or use "Select all records matching criteria" |
| Merged PDF chosen for fulfillments, but the fulfillments to print belong to several merchants | Blocks the download and shows "The selected picking lists belong to multiple merchants, so their fulfillments cannot be merged into one PDF. Please download as ZIP instead." | Each merchant's fulfillment template may use a different paper size, and a single merged file can only use one paper setting, so it would print in the wrong layout. Choose ZIP instead, or filter by merchant first and merge each separately |
| The selection includes Work Order Picking picking lists | When downloading fulfillments, skips them and shows how many were skipped; the rest are generated as usual | Work order picking takes materials for production and has no fulfillment to ship. Picking list downloads still include them |
| None of the selected picking lists' waves has any fulfillment | Shows "The waves of the selected picking lists have no fulfillments to download" and produces no blank file | If the selection is all Work Order Picking picking lists, the message also states how many were skipped |
| One picking list or fulfillment cannot be laid out | The whole batch stops, so you never get a file with missing pages; "Background Jobs" shows which one failed | Check that record's data, then download again |
The multi-merchant check looks at the merchants of the fulfillments that will actually be printed; picking lists whose waves have no fulfillments do not affect it.
3.4 Large Volumes
The two downloads themselves have no count limit; the only limit is that "Select all records matching criteria" selects up to 50,000 records at a time. But each download produces a single file, and if any one record cannot be laid out, the whole batch stops and must be redone. The more records, the longer it takes to generate and the more you redo when something fails.
On high-volume days, you can split the download into several batches using filters such as merchant or creation date. Splitting also makes it easy to hand each batch straight to a different team.
4. Boundaries and Related Features
Quick links: How this differs from printing on the wave page | Rule boundaries | Related features
4.1 How This Differs from Printing on the Wave Page
Wave Detail can also print picking lists and fulfillment details with the same layout. The difference is how much each action covers:
| Entry point | Scope per action | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| "Print Picking Lists" on Wave Detail | One wave, optionally only some of its picking lists | Reprinting one wave, or only a few of its picking lists |
| "Print Fulfillment Details" on Wave Detail | All fulfillments of one wave | Reprinting one wave's fulfillments |
| The two batch downloads on the picking list list | The selected picking lists, across multiple waves | Printing the whole day's batch at the start of the shift |
4.2 Rule Boundaries
- Picking list output does not total items across picking lists; if you need "how much do we pick in total today," this paper does not give you that sum directly.
- Fulfillments are printed per wave; from the picking list list you cannot print only some of a wave's fulfillments.
- Batch download cannot use a different template; it always uses the Custom Templates bound to each order's channel.
- Downloading only produces files. It does not change the status or inventory of picking lists or fulfillments, and it does not record what has already been printed; you can download the same batch again.
4.3 Related Features
| Feature | Purpose | Link |
|---|---|---|
| Picking list list | Filter, select, and batch download picking lists and fulfillments | Go |
| Generate Picking List | Turn the day's fulfillments into picking lists first | Go |
| Wave Detail | Print a single wave, return fulfillments | Go |
| Picking List Detail | Download a single picking list, pick | Go |
| Print Templates | Set up each channel's fulfillment layout | Go |