I sell stamps on eBay. My objective is to give the customer “next day shipping”, that is, the day after payment is received, the stamps are shipped. When you deal in stamps, you sell a lot of small and sometimes similar items, each with its own unique image, description, lot number, etc. It takes a long time to enter 50 unique lots, but I can usually do this over the course of a week. Each item is identified with the AW2000 lot number. Then, at my favorite time on Saturday or Sunday, I use AW2000 to list them allowing a 1-minute snipe interval between lots.

The sale is over, winning bidders have been notified, and the check arrived in the mail today. The tasks listed below (A through F) are performed:

A. This is the by the numbers procedure for “mail processing”:
1) Open mail and determine invoice number. The variants here are truly amazing and certainly exemplify Einstein’s statement about infinite things. Sometimes, I have to figure out which invoice and lots based on transaction amount alone!
2) Ensure correct payment is enclosed,
3) Update invoice to reflect payment received date and checkmark,
4) Update invoice with ship date,
5) Update invoice status to “Waiting to ship”,
6) Write the invoice number on mailed material.

B. After all mail is processed, display invoices “Waiting to ship” and ensure the correct ones are displayed by matching them to the invoice number written on the mail and then for each:
1) Click invoice,
2) Then click print invoice,
3) Then reply “OK” to the “which printer prompt”,
4) Click Queue shipping label,
5) Click email from template
6) Select shipping confirmation email,
7) Click queue email.

C. After all invoices have been printed:
1) Write “Paid” on invoices,
2) Print queued shipping labels.

D. For each invoice, carefully, pull all lots for that invoice (this is difficult because the AW2000 lot number is not on the invoice) and double check!

E. For each shipment,
1) Pack
2) Affix mailing label
3) Seal
4) Apply postage

F. Finally, for each invoice, update status to “feedback not left” and reply “yes” to the annoying confirmation.

How can this be improved?
1) Parts “A” and “B” are done separately because if they were combined, it would be too easy to get confused as to which things had been done and which had not been done, for example: “Did I just queue a shipping label?”
2) Part “A” will remain a manual process, but it would be convenient if the checkmark was automatically set when a payment received date was entered,
3) Part “B” can be automated into a task that is performed for each invoice “waiting to ship”, I’d consider this a significant improvement,
4) Part “D” would be greatly simplified if the AW2000 lot number could be printed on the invoice,
5) Part “F” could optionally be made a part of part “B”, and by all means, suppress the confirmation. When done manually, it’s too easy to get confused if its combined with part “B”.

OK, I'm confused. Why are you updating status manually? If you enter a payment on the invoice, AW2K automatically updates the invoice status to Waiting To Ship, for example.

I guess because I didn't know about the record payment function. I'll give that a try. Thanks!