SPAM - A COMPUTER-MODEL FOR MANAGEMENT OF SPARE-PARTS INVENTORIES IN AGRICULTURAL MACHINERY DEALERSHIPS

A user-friendly computer model has been developed to assist agricultural machinery dealerships in managing inventories of spare parts available at their stores. The model ''SPAM'' is encoded in PASCAL language on IBM-compatible personal computers. The model is based on mathematical theories that forecast economic order quantities, economic order point, and lag period based on both periodic factual input data analysis and update, and cash-flow economic assessment. The model also provides a comprehensive package for inventory management including stock analysis, inventory costs, part ordering, invoicing, and parts description. In addition, it takes into account monthly demand fluctuations resulting from variations due to seasonal agricultural operations. The model requires a minimum of 3 Mb hard disk space allocation, is initialized by an 'autoexecution' batch file, and is run from selective menus displayed on the user's screen. Printed outputs include parts description cards, stock analysis reports, part orders, and invoices.