Introduction

Order Picking is the process of receiving goods in a given unit size, retrieving them from storage and shipping them in a different unit size. Of critical importance in Order Picking is selecting the correct item in the correct quantities to the satisfaction of customer requirements. Order Picking is a labor-intensive activity. It cannot be done in a hurried manner because mistakes are difficult to catch, costly to correct, and have a devastating effect on quality

Customers may require goods in pallet, case or unit quantities. In the case of pallet quantities, goods can be extracted from the reserve storage areas and brought directly to the marshaling area by the types of equipment described earlier (eg by a reach truck or a combination of stacker crane and conveyor). This chapter is therefore chiefly concerned with case and unit picking operations. For example, cases may be picked from pallets held in ground floor locations for specific customer orders or individual units may be picked from plastic tote bins held on shelving. These would then typically be checked, collated with other goods, packed (if necessary) and moved to the marshaling area to form vehicle loads ready for dispatch.

In general, picking still tends to be largely a manual operation. However, there are many technological aids in terms of information systems and equipment that may be used to provide high levels of productivity and accuracy. Thus, whilst advanced ‘automated warehouses’ can oft en work effectively without direct operatives in the pallet reserve storage areas, the case and unit picking operations tend to be manually operated with technological assistance.

In general, Order Picking can occur on one of five levels depending on the size of the unit that is being picked.

• Pallet Picking – Retrieval of full pallets
• Layer Picking – Retrieval of layers of cases
• Case Picking – Retrieval of inner packs from cases
• Split Case Picking – Retrieval of inner packs from cases
• Broken Case Picking – Retrieval of individual, discrete items