Laboratory inventory management: reagents, consumables, equipment and expiry dates
A laboratory stock cannot be managed like an industrial one. Expiry is a primary constraint there, not an edge case. The supplier lot carries the link upstream, and storage conditions belong in the item record. General-purpose inventory tools stumble on exactly these points. Here is what a regulated stock requires, and what you need to put in place.
What do the regulations require?
A general-purpose inventory tool knows how to count. What traceability and ISO 13485 ask of a laboratory stock goes further, on three points where those tools fall short. Three terms come up along the way.
- Supplier lot
- The number assigned by the manufacturer of the reagent or consumable. For materials managed by lot and included in your traceability scope, it is what lets you trace back upstream: it must stay linked to the receipts and consumptions concerned. The extent of traceability expected depends on the product, the applicable requirements and your quality system.
- FEFO
- First Expired, First Out: use first what expires first, not what arrived first (FIFO). With short-lived reagents, the difference between the two rules shows up as losses. Applying it requires an expiry date recorded per lot, not per item.
- Metrology
- Keeping track of the calibration and verification of measuring equipment; ISO 13485 devotes a dedicated clause to it. In practice, knowing the date of the next check and the production runs covered by the previous one makes impact analysis easier when a deviation is found.
| Lab stock specific | What it implies |
|---|---|
| Expiry by lot | Two receipts of the same item do not have the same use-by limit. A stock aggregated by item makes the FEFO rule impossible to apply and keeps losses invisible until the stocktake. |
| Supplier lot & traceability | The lot number must be kept and linked to production runs as soon as it falls within the traceability scope (ISO 13485): it carries the link upstream, including for partial withdrawals from a bottle. |
| Quality status & storage | A lot that has been received but not accepted must not be usable like a released lot. Temperature, incompatibilities and CLP / GHS classification are part of the stock data, not of a separate procedure. |
Operational summary: the exact extent of traceability expected depends on the product, the applicable requirements and your quality system.
What should you do?
There is no need to overhaul everything at once. This order produces visible results at every step, whatever the tool.
- Record the supplier lot on receipt, with the expiry date, quantity, quality status and the documents attached to the lot (certificate of analysis, delivery note, safety data sheet).
- Track expiry by lot and apply the FEFO rule, so that losses become visible before the stocktake.
- Link every consumption, even a partial one, to a lot and to a production run: this is what turns a quantity counter into a traceability tool.
- Base alert thresholds on actual consumption and revise them when activity changes, rather than on a fixed estimate.
- Track equipment and its metrology within the same scope as the stock, so you can find the production runs served by an instrument that drifts.
- Move to cycle counting, to spot discrepancies while their cause can still be identified.
The stockroom and production in the same system
In Arianis, inventory is not a separate module: each consumption is entered from the production run, linked to the lot consumed, and flows automatically into the genealogy of the lot produced.
- Consumables, reagents, tools and equipment listed with quantities, expiry dates and locations.
- Email alerts on expiry dates and low stock levels; QR code and barcode scanning from a smartphone, with no dedicated hardware.
- Configurable CLP / GHS classifications, units and thresholds; tracking of equipment and its metrology.
- Every consumption entered from production and linked to its lot, feeding the genealogy; native CSV exports.
The Cerebellis software related to this topic
Further reading
Equipment metrology management: the real issue starts when an instrument drifts
Calibration, verification, intervals and out-of-tolerance results: controlling measuring equipment and immediately finding the lots that may be affected.
Computerized system validation (CSV) according to GAMP 5
Software categories, V-model, risk analysis and traceability matrix: how GAMP 5 structures a risk-proportionate computerized system validation.
Producing PMS and PSUR reports without rebuilding the data by hand
A PSUR links exposure, incidents, trends and actions. Why this data lives in two systems, production and quality, and how to bring it together to produce the report without re-entry.