Physical inventory count software for barcode scanners
The physical inventory count your accountant wants, on the Zebra scanners you already own, watched live by the supervisor, exported to the system you run. Priced per count, not per year — built for the business that counts once at year-end.
Also called a stocktake, stock count, full count or wall-to-wall count.
From US$95 a count · US$59 per scanner, US$48 from ten · unlimited operators and sites · no subscription
| Bin | Part | Qty | User |
|---|---|---|---|
| A-03-02 | 4402-118 | 24 | Maria |
| A-03-02 | 4402-119 | 12 | Maria |
| B-11-04 | 7710-003 | 8 | Dev |
| C-02-01 | 0363-5556 | 40 | Sam |
| A-03-03 | 4402-201 | 3 | Maria |
| B-11-05 | 7710-011 | 6 | Dev |
How a count runs
| Site Name | Bin Location | Part Number | Barcode | Part Description | Count | User Name | Date | Time | Withdrawn |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Warehouse 2 | C-02-01 | 0363-5556 | ="0363555664340" | Filter, oil, spin-on | 40 | Sam | 12/31/2026 | 10:42:15 | |
| Warehouse 2 | A-03-02 | 4402-118 | ="9312345678907" | Bearing, 6204-2RS | 24 | Maria | 12/31/2026 | 10:41:52 | |
| Warehouse 2 | A-03-02 | 4402-118 | ="9312345678907" | Bearing, 6204-2RS | 22 | Maria | 12/31/2026 | 10:39:10 | Y |
Why this, and not…
A crew turns up with their scanners and their software and counts your stock for a few thousand dollars a night. You get a number; they get the data. With Stocktakes Online your own people count on your own scanners, you watch it happen, and a five-scanner count costs US$295.
Most inventory platforms unlock counting only on their higher tiers — US$74 to US$799 a month, billed for the year. For a business that counts once at December 31, that is twelve months of rent for one night's work. Stocktakes Online charges for the night.
Cheap, and fine for two hundred lines. At two thousand lines across forty bins and six counters, nobody knows what has been counted, what has been missed, or who scanned the wrong shelf. Stocktakes Online knows, live, on the portal.
A camera reads a barcode in about a second, in good light, held still. A Zebra reads it the instant the trigger is pulled, in a freezer, with gloves on, all night. Most warehouses already own one. Use it.
And if you already run a full warehouse system with counting built in — keep it. Stocktakes Online is for the business that doesn't.
Pricing
Most businesses count once or twice. A subscription charges you for the other eleven months. Stocktakes Online is sold per count: open one, count it, close it, export it. Nothing recurring, nothing to cancel.
Priced on how many scanners count at once — that is the number that decides how fast your count goes, so it is the number you buy. Operators are unlimited: put as many names on the system as you like, and sites cost nothing.
Those are examples of the rule, not a menu — any number of scanners has a price. Seven is US$413 and eight is US$472. Nine is US$480 — the same as ten, because at ten the rate drops to US$48 and applies to all of them, and you should never pay more for fewer scanners.
What's included in every count:
Email us to book a count and we'll set it up with you.
Reports
By bin, by site, by company. The number the accountant wants, at any moment.
Bins and parts that nobody has scanned yet. This is how you know you're finished — not by hoping.
Locations checked and found empty. Either it's true or someone missed a shelf.
Who counted what, how fast, and when. Useful for pay, useful for training, useful for arguments.
A recount replaces a count; it doesn't erase it. The trail stays.
Every scan, every field, one CSV. Import it, pivot it, archive it.
Scanners
Stocktakes Online is an Android app for Zebra rugged scanners, from the compact TC22 to the cold-store MC9400. It runs on Android 5.1 and newer, which is most of what is sitting in American drawers — so the scanners you already own are probably enough.
Tell us the model number and we'll tell you straight whether we have run it. We say which ones we have tested and which we have not, because a scanner that turns out not to work on count night is not a small problem.
Honeywell, Datalogic and the rest. The app needs the scanner to hand a barcode to the screen as typed text ending in Enter, which every industrial Android scanner can do — but each brand sets it up in its own utility, and we have only done it on Zebra. We are not going to pretend otherwise. Ask, and we'll work through it with you.
We've sold and supported Zebra hardware for thirty-five years, and we'll spec the right unit for your aisles, your freezer and your budget — that advice is free and it's the part we're good at.
We don't sell hardware in the United States and we won't recommend a reseller we haven't dealt with. Zebra's own locator will find one near you.
Not phones. A camera is not a scan engine — a Zebra reads a barcode the instant the trigger is pulled, in a freezer, with gloves on, all day.
Works with
Which is everything. QuickBooks Online is the one worth naming: its own Inventory Counts screen takes typed numbers only, so a scanner count has to arrive as a file. These all export a part list and take a count file back:
Tell us which one you run and we'll get the export into the shape it wants. If you are on something not listed, it almost certainly still works — ask.
Questions
Not if you have Zebra Android scanners on Android 5.1 or newer. Tell us the model number and we'll tell you whether we've run it — and if we haven't, we'll say so. If you don't have any, Zebra's reseller locator will find you one; we'll spec the right model first, free.
No. You pay per count: one counting event, one license, seven days. Count once a year, pay once a year. If you count every month, ask about an annual license instead.
Yes. Send us your parts and bins and we'll set up an account with your own warehouse in it. Load it, add your operators, and try Check mode on your own scanner — looking up a part or a bin without recording anything — so you know your scanners work before you count for real.
Every scan is banked to the portal as it happens; nothing is stored on the device. A lost scanner is a lost scanner — the count is intact. Managed PostgreSQL with automated backups and point-in-time recovery over a rolling seven days. Each company's data is separated by keys the database itself enforces, so a cross-company reference is refused by Postgres rather than merely avoided by the application. Closed counts stay reportable for later audits.
Every count is a live call to the portal. If it doesn't arrive, the operator is told immediately, while they're still standing at the rack, and that count is not recorded — they scan it again once they're back in coverage. Nothing accepted is ever lost, and nothing is silently missing. It does mean you need Wi-Fi everywhere you count; test coverage before the day.
Two CSV files — parts and bin locations — uploaded through the portal. Your browser parses them and shows the row count, the first few rows and any lines it skipped before anything is saved. Parts are part number, barcode and description; bins are a location and a description. A header row is optional. If you can export a spreadsheet, you can load Stocktakes Online. If your file needs cleaning, we quote for that.
No. A camera is not a scan engine: a phone reads a barcode in about a second, in good light, held still. A Zebra reads it the moment the trigger is pulled and keeps doing it in a freezer with gloves on. Operators log in with a short username and a PIN they can type wearing gloves.
One CSV: Site Name, Bin Location, Part Number, Barcode, Part Description, Count, User Name, Date, Time, Withdrawn. Barcodes are wrapped so Excel keeps the leading zeros. Plus totals, gaps, empty bins and scans-by-user, on screen or exported.
Operators can amend their own quantity or withdraw the count on the device. A withdrawn count leaves every total immediately, but the record stays for the administrator to see. Scan the same part in the same bin twice and the device asks: second pile, or a correction to the first? Two operators counting the same bin show up as a discrepancy in the reports, with names attached.
Scan the bin and mark it empty on the device. The reports then tell "checked and empty" apart from "nobody went there" — which are very different answers on count night.
Three modes: Scan/Count (bin, part, key the quantity), Scan/Increment (every trigger pull adds one — type to override), and Check (look up a part or a bin without recording anything).
Yes. Unlimited sites on a single count, and the portal shows each site's progress separately.
QuickBooks Online has no barcode scanning of its own, and its Inventory Counts screen only takes typed numbers — so you count on the scanner and Stocktakes Online gives you a count file in the layout your import tool expects, one line per item with the new quantity, dated for the count. The file has the part number and the counted quantity, which is what an import tool asks for, and we'll help you get it into the shape yours wants. We don't post into QuickBooks for you.
No. Stocktakes Online counts stock. That's the whole job, and it's why it takes an hour to learn, not a week.
The person who built it — and the time difference works in your favor. A count running 5 pm to midnight Eastern is 9 am to 4 pm in Sydney, an ordinary working day here, so the count-day line is answered 5 pm to midnight Eastern, weekends included. That is exactly when American warehouses count, and when most vendors' staff have gone home. Outside that, email — we're a long way away and we'd rather say so than promise a phone call at 3 am. Email reaches us any time; we answer Sydney business hours.
Since 2008
Stocktakes Online started life inside ScanTrack Systems, the hosted stock system Barcode Datalink has run for customers since 2008. This is that counting product rebuilt for Android scanners, by the same people, who have spent thirty-five years getting things scanned in warehouses. Australian company, American customers, and we'll tell you that up front rather than have you find out.
Contact
Tell us the date, how many people will be counting, and what system the numbers go back into. You'll get a set-up call the week before. Counting at year-end? Book by mid-December.