An expiry date tells you the last day a batch is good to sell or use. Qoblex records an expiry date against each batch, shows it in the Batches list, warns you when a batch is close to its date, and lets you filter the list to find stock that is expiring or already past its date. Because a serial number is simply a one-unit batch, everything here applies to serial-tracked units too.
After reading this, you will know where expiry dates come from, how to read the warning icons and status labels, and how to pull up a list of expiring stock. Qoblex has no separate expiry report; you find expiring stock by filtering the Batches list.
Where expiry dates come from
An expiry date is stored on the batch record itself. There are three ways it gets set:
- At receiving. When you receive a batch-tracked or serial-tracked line on a purchase order, the receiving dialog gives you an Expires At field for each batch, next to the batch number and quantity.
- By CSV. The batch stocktake CSV import carries an Expiry Date column, so you can set or correct expiry dates in bulk. See Import or update batches by CSV.
- Through other batch-aware workflows. Batches created during stock operations carry whatever expiry was entered at the time.
Leave the expiry date blank only when the physical batch genuinely has no expiry. A blank date means the batch is never flagged as expiring or expired.
Important: Record the expiry date when you first receive the batch. Once the stock has moved between locations or been partly shipped, correcting the expiry date afterward is far more error-prone, so enter it accurately at the point of receiving.
The Expire at column
In the Batches list, each batch’s expiry date appears in the Expire at column. Batches with no expiry date leave this column empty and never trigger a warning.
Next to the batch number, in the Batch N° column, Qoblex shows a warning icon when a batch is at or past its expiry date:
- The icon appears when the batch expires in 10 days or fewer, including dates already in the past.
- The icon is red when the batch is already expired, with the tooltip “This batch has expired.”
- The icon is orange when the batch is expiring soon (within 10 days but not yet past), with the tooltip “This batch is expiring soon !”
The Batches list warning icon uses a 10-day window. This is deliberately shorter than the 30-day window used by the status labels described below.
Status labels: Active, Expiring soon, Expired
Where a batch is shown as a small usage chip, for example when reviewing which batches back a given line, Qoblex adds a status label based on the expiry date:
- Expired – the expiry date is in the past.
- Expiring soon – the batch expires within 30 days and is not yet past.
- Active – the batch expires more than 30 days out, or has no expiry date at all.
The chip status window (30 days) is wider than the list warning-icon window (10 days). A batch expiring in, say, 20 days reads as “Expiring soon” on a chip but does not yet show the warning icon in the Batches list. State each window as it applies; do not treat them as the same.
Finding expiring or expired stock
Qoblex does not provide a separate expiry report. You find expiring stock by filtering the Batches list directly.
- Open the Batches list (Batches & Serial Tracking).
- Add a filter on Expire at. This is a date-range filter.
- Set the range to the period you care about: – To find stock that is already expired, set the range to end at today or earlier. – To find stock expiring soon, set the range from today to a future cutoff, for example the next 30 days.
- Read the results. Batches within 10 days of expiry also carry the red or orange warning icon beside the batch number, so expired and near-expired rows stand out at a glance.
You can combine the Expire at filter with the Location, Product Variant, Sku, or Batch N° filters to focus on one site or product. For the full column and filter list, see View and filter batches.
When reviewing results, check both Available Quantity and Reserved Quantity. A batch may be expiring soon while some of its stock is already reserved for another order.
What Qoblex does automatically
- Recalculates the days remaining until each batch’s expiry date every time the list is shown, so warnings are always current.
- Shows the red “expired” icon and tooltip for any batch whose date has passed, and the orange “expiring soon” icon for batches within 10 days.
- Applies the 30-day “Expiring soon” and past-date “Expired” status labels on batch chips.
- Leaves batches with no expiry date unflagged and treated as “Active”.
Expiry dates, batch numbers, and serial numbers are internal to Qoblex. They are not pushed to or pulled from Shopify, Xero, QuickBooks, or Amazon.