Item Units of Measure (IUMs) encapsulate different configurations of item groupings. Each IUM has a set of Attributes, among them:

• Length
• Width
• Height
• Weight
• Quantity Unit of Measure (Each, Inner-Pack, Case, Pallet)
• Conversion Qty (the number of Eaches for the Given Quantity Unit of Measure)
• Does this IUM need containerization or is it ready to ship?

An IUM might be associated with an Item Class or with a distinct Item. And an Item or Item Class might have one to many IUMs – the Case for an Item has different attributes than a single unit of that item.

What is important, however, is that the digital configurations of your IUMs match the actual dimensions and attributes of your products on the floor. IUMs provide the dimensions for shipping containerization, inventory putaway, materials handling for inventory movement. They provide the specs needed to validate location capacities and shipment rating with carriers. They can prove the difference between being charged for 1 pallet pick vs 800 Eaches picks from a pallet location. If your IUMs aren’t accurate and/or consistent among your actual physical products, then all of these processes devolve into disarray. At best, you might need to split some t-shirts across two forward pick locations because you missed a decimal place in the height of your case. At worst, you might be in a world of hurt because you shipped 10,000 identical shipments that weighed 0.4 lbs having bought postage at 4.0 lbs.