Business Units (Centers)
Manage warehouses, branches, outlets, and departments.
A center — a business unit — is the fundamental unit of location in Trabalance. Every inventory movement, fixed asset, cost allocation, and financial transaction can be tagged to a center — giving you visibility into performance, stock, and costs not just for the business as a whole, but for each warehouse, branch, outlet, or department individually.
Centers are organized hierarchically. A head office can contain branches. A branch can contain departments or storage zones. There is no limit on depth.
The Business Units Page
Navigate to: Operations → Business Units
The Business Units page lists the centers you have access to. Above the list, summary cards count Active and Inactive units and a Type select scopes the list; click a card to filter by status.
Page controls:
- New — opens the center creation form
- Search — find centers by name or address
- Filter — a sheet with facets for Type (Warehouse, Sales Outlet, Branch, Others) and Status (Active, Inactive)
- Export — CSV or PDF; Columns — show or hide columns
- Import — bulk upload with the columns Name, Type, Parent, Address, Phone, Email, Date Operational, Status, Is Update
Table columns: Name, Type, Parent, Status, Address. Click a row to open the unit.
Creating a Center
Click New to open the creation form. Fields can be updated at any time with Edit Center on the unit's page.
| Field | Required? | Details |
|---|---|---|
| Center Name | Yes | The display name of this center as it appears on documents, reports, and filters (e.g., "London Warehouse", "Singapore Sales Office", "Toronto Branch"). |
| Description | No | A brief description of the center's purpose, what it handles, or any operational notes. |
| Unit Type | Yes | The classification of this center: Warehouse, Sales Outlet, Branch, or Others. See Center Types below. |
| Status | No | Active (default) or Inactive. Only Active centers appear in location pickers; Inactive centers retain all historical data. The picker offers a third option, Under Maintenance — see the warning below. |
| Parent Center | No | Select a parent to place this center in the hierarchy. Leave blank for top-level centers. A center can have only one parent. |
| Address | Yes | The physical address of the location, as free text. |
| Phone Number | Yes | Main contact number for this center. |
| Yes | Contact email for this center. | |
| Center Manager | No | The user responsible for this center. You can pick an existing user or create a new team member (created with the Staff role) from the form. |
| Date Operational | Yes | The date this center began (or will begin) operations. |
| Capacity | No | Storage or operational capacity as a number; the unit is whatever is meaningful to you. Informational. |
| Operating Hours | No | Same hours every day (one open and close time), or per-day open/close times with any day marked closed. |
| Logo | No | A per-location logo that replaces the business logo on this unit's documents. |
Center Types
| Type | Primary Purpose | Where It Shows |
|---|---|---|
| Warehouse | Physical stock storage and dispatch location | A label for people and reports: the Type column, the Type facet and select on the list, and the unit's Overview. |
| Sales Outlet | Retail point of sale or customer-facing service location | Same — every unit has the same tabs and features regardless of type. |
| Branch | A full business location with revenue, costs, and staff | Same. |
| Others | Departments, cost centers, virtual groupings, or any location type that does not fit the above | Same. Used for head office departments (Finance, HR, IT), project-based cost centers, or virtual centers for reporting segmentation. |
Center Detail — The Tabs
Click any center to open its page. The header offers Edit Center, Delete and, for administrators, promotion of the unit to its own company. The page has five tabs, plus a Sub-Centers tab when the unit has children.
| Tab | What It Shows | Key Actions |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | Center Information (Type, Status, Manager, Parent Unit, Capacity, Date Operational, Phone, Email, Address, Description), Operating Hours, a Sub-Centers preview, and Business Metrics for a chosen date range: Revenue, Cost of Sales, Gross Profit, Net Income, Total Sales, Total Purchases, Inventory Value. | Change the date range; Edit Center |
| Sub-Centers | All centers that have this center set as their parent, with status and type. | Navigate to a sub-center |
| Performance | Center-level figures for the selected period. | Change date range |
| Stock | Three sub-tabs: Inventory (stock held at this unit), Transfers (Receiving, Sending, Requests, History), Allowed Items (which items this unit may stock). | Transfer Stock, Request Stock, approve or cancel pending transfers |
| Assets | All fixed assets assigned to this center: Name, Method, Useful Life, Cost, Accum. Depreciation, Net Book Value. | Open an asset |
| Documents | Documents associated with this center. | Open a document |
Only two statuses are real: Active and Inactive. The status picker offers a third, Under Maintenance, but nothing in the system treats it as anything other than Active — a unit set to it still appears in every location picker, every document dropdown, and every active list, while its badge reads Maintenance. If you want a unit out of circulation, set it to Inactive.
Operating Hours
Operating hours are informational — they are displayed on the unit's Overview, but the system does not restrict transactions to operating hours. They are primarily used for:
- Customer-facing information (outlet hours)
- Logistics planning (delivery windows for warehouse centers)
- Staff scheduling reference (managers setting shift coverage)
To configure operating hours, open the unit, click Edit Center, and in the Operations section either keep "same hours every day" with one open and close time, or set each day's open and close time and mark closed days.
Stock Transfers Between Centers
Moving stock from one center to another uses the Transfers sub-tab on the sending unit's Stock tab.
| Method | How to Access | Best For | Key Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Transfer Stock | Open the sending unit → Stock tab → Transfers → Transfer Stock | The sender knows what to ship — e.g., restocking a branch from the warehouse | One dialog with one destination, or several destinations each with its own item lines. Creates Pending transfer(s) the receiving unit approves. |
| Request Stock | Open the receiving unit → Stock tab → Transfers → Request Stock | The receiver knows what it needs | Creates a transfer request the source fulfils with a Transfer Note, which the receiver then approves. |
An item carries one average cost across the business, so a transfer changes where the quantity sits and nothing else. No journal is posted; the total value of inventory in the business does not change and no P&L impact occurs. Stock moves at the moment the receiving unit approves the transfer.
Center-Level Control
Centers serve as a filtering and access control mechanism across the entire application.
| Module | Center-Based Filtering Behavior |
|---|---|
| Inventory | Stock on hand, adjustments, and transfers are all center-specific. The Inventories page can be filtered to show one center at a time. |
| Fixed Assets | Each asset is assigned to one center. Depreciation expense posts to the center's cost allocation. The Assets tab on each center detail shows all assets at that location. |
| Production | Each production batch is assigned to a center (the production facility). Material consumption and output inventory are drawn from and credited to that center. |
| Projects | Projects are assigned to a center. Revenue and costs flow through that center's P&L. |
| Sales | Invoices and receipts can be tagged to a center for revenue tracking by location. |
| Purchases | Bills and GRNs can be tagged to a center for cost tracking by location. |
| People / Payroll | Employees are assigned to a center (their primary location). Payroll costs post to the center's salary expense. |
| Finance Reports | Profit & Loss, Trial Balance, and Balance Sheet can all be filtered by center to produce location-specific financial statements. |
Centers are referenced by virtually every transaction in the system. Setting up the center hierarchy before beginning data entry avoids the need to retroactively reassign documents. If your business has even two physical locations, configure centers at setup.
Deactivating or Deleting a Center
To deactivate a center, open its page, click Edit Center, and set Status to Inactive. The center stops appearing in location pickers (after your next sign-in, since pickers use a login-time snapshot). All historical data remains accessible.
Delete is only available for an empty location — one with no documents, journals, inventory, or sub-locations. A location with activity cannot be deleted; the dialog says so and asks you to disable it instead.
Parent-Child Center Hierarchy
The hierarchy allows performance and stock reporting to roll up from sub-centers to parent centers. For example:
- Global Distribution Ltd (top-level parent)
- UK Operations (branch)
- London Warehouse (warehouse)
- Manchester Outlet (sales outlet)
- APAC Operations (branch)
- Singapore Hub (warehouse)
- Sydney Outlet (sales outlet)
- UK Operations (branch)
Reports run at the "UK Operations" level aggregate data from both the London Warehouse and the Manchester Outlet. Reports run at the "Global Distribution Ltd" level aggregate everything.
There is no enforced limit on hierarchy depth, but more than four levels is uncommon and can make filtering and reporting cumbersome.
Related
- Center types — Warehouse, Sales Outlet, Branch, Others
- Creating a center — every field on the form
- Allowed items — curating what a unit may trade in
- Stock transfers between centers — moving stock unit to unit
- Requesting stock — asking another unit to send stock
- Registering an asset — tagging an asset to a unit