Module 05 — Inventory Health, Account Health, and WIP Tiles
Use the audio for the first pass, then use the transcript as the operating reference.
Transcript / lesson notes
Module 05 — Inventory Health, Account Health, and WIP Tiles
This module covers diagnostic inventory/account tiles and provisional WIP tiles. These are important, but they are usually second-layer after the core warehouse/order/prep and MAP workflows.
Inventory Management cluster
Tiles involved: FBA Inventory, Aging Inventory, Stuck Inventory, IPI, and Inbound Noncompliance.
How to separate them:
- FBA Inventory: what Amazon currently has.
- Aging Inventory: what is getting old.
- Stuck Inventory: what is not flowing.
- IPI: account-level inventory performance.
- Inbound Noncompliance: shipment or inbound problems.
Restock Dashboard asks what to order. Warehouse Inventory asks what Brent physically has. Inventory Management asks what Amazon has and whether it is healthy.
1. FBA Inventory
Purpose: monitors Amazon-side sellable, reserved, inbound, and related inventory states.
Escalate when Restock Dashboard says one thing but FBA Inventory suggests another.
Ask Fergus: “Is this sellable FBA stock, reserved stock, inbound stock, unfulfillable stock, or physically warehouse stock?”
2. Aging Inventory
Purpose: identifies inventory that is aging and may create fee or account-health pressure.
Escalate when a product appears as a restock opportunity but also has aged inventory risk.
Ask Fergus: “Are we trying to buy more of something Amazon already considers aging?”
3. Stuck Inventory
Purpose: identifies stock that exists but may not be moving, flowing, or becoming sellable as expected.
Escalate when FBA stock exists but sales/restock logic behaves as if it is unavailable.
Ask Fergus: “Is this stock sellable, reserved, stranded, stuck, or delayed?”
4. IPI Score & Performance
Purpose: account-level inventory performance and manual entry context.
Escalate when inventory decisions may affect account health or IPI pressure.
Ask Fergus: “Is this a SKU-level inventory problem or an account-level inventory health problem?”
5. Inbound Noncompliance
Purpose: highlights Amazon inbound or shipment compliance problems.
Use it when shipment issues, prep problems, or Amazon receiving problems may explain inventory weirdness.
Ask Fergus: “Is this inventory issue caused by inbound noncompliance or receiving delay?”
WIP and Under Construction
Treat WIP tiles as provisional. They may contain active experiments, incomplete validation, or staging logic. Do not use WIP output as final evidence without checking timestamps and asking Fergus.
Examples of WIP/provisional areas:
- FC Distribution Intelligence: useful for fulfillment-center coverage and transfer-risk analysis, but timestamp-sensitive.
- Variation Sales and Variation Groups: useful but validation-heavy.
- Advertising Performance: API setup required; live campaign metrics are not connected yet.
- Equipment: shared warehouse equipment/request queue, useful but not core Amazon analysis.
Safe interpretation rule
If a WIP tile disagrees with a production tile, production wins until Fergus says otherwise.
Better escalation:
“I see a WIP tile suggesting X, but the production tile says Y. Is WIP testing a new model, or should I ignore it for now?”
End of module 05.