Availability Checker
Phantom inventory — also called ghost stock — masks out-of-stock products by showing items that aren’t available on the shelf. Replenishment isn’t triggered, shelves remain empty, and sales are lost. What starts as an inventory issue quickly becomes a cycle of poor availability and significant lost revenue.
The result? Missed sales, inaccurate product forecasts, ineffective replenishment, and a poor customer experience.
How data-led is your availability process?
Your best-sellers have stopped selling, and no one can see why
Head office reporting shows healthy stock on hand, so replenishment looks unnecessary. But on the shop floor the shelf is empty, the customer can’t find the item, and the sale is lost. That gap between the stock file and the shelf is phantom inventory.
Even once replenishment restarts, sales averages stay depressed and can take multiple cycles to recover. The damage outlasts the stockout.
Solve it easily with Availability Checker
- Take rapid, store-specific action, targeting problem products
- Recover sales, prioritising products with the greatest revenue impact
- Increase replenishment accuracy, quickly identifying genuine out-of-stocks
- Improve product forecasting, separating inventory errors from true customer demand
- Boost on-shelf availability, ensuring customers can find the products they want
- Gain end-to-end visibility of availability checks, driving accountability and faster resolution
- Reduce time investigating stock discrepancies by guiding colleagues through prioritised checks
Availability impact on retailers
From analysis, to action on the shop floor
Analyse inventory behaviour alongside sales performance, identifying products that should be selling – but aren’t.
Data-driven priorities focus store labour where it will have the greatest commercial impact.
Stock Checklist
Provide store-level products to check where stock is on file, but sales are zero or declining, or stock is negative.
Check Workflow
A guided prompt to verify shelf stock, address gaps, replenish, and record the outcome.
Stock File Correction
Stock file status updated based on true shelf and back stock availability, clearing the check flag.
Audit Trail
Every check is logged by store, by colleague, by time and outcome, providing a visible audit trail.
Data Export
Extract and share checked items by store, with reason codes, stock quantity and scan data.
Reporting Dashboard
Completed and outstanding checks by store or total, with outcomes including replenishment and stock adjustments.
Drive performance where it matters most
Move from reactive routines to intelligence-led prioritisation, directing existing labour to the highest-impact opportunities for sales, inventory confidence and customer experience
Revenue
Inventory
Labour
Improve productivity by directing existing labour to the highest-value investigations; not generic routines.
Customer
See how Availability Checker works
Fewer lost sales, less wasted replenishment, and a stock system your teams can trust. Head office and store teams see the same accurate picture of what’s on the shelf, not two different versions of it.
- Fewer lost sales, with a clear result for every item checked
- Stock records that match what's actually on the shelf
- A reason for missing stock, not just the fact that it's missing
- A full record of who checked, when, and what they found
Frequently asked questions about phantom inventory & stock availability
Common questions about phantom inventory, on-shelf availability and stock file accuracy in retail.
What does phantom inventory mean?
What causes phantom inventory?
How do you detect phantom inventory?
By comparing what your stock file claims against what’s actually on the shelf. The signal is products where stock is on file, but sales are zero or declining, or stock is negative. Availability Checker analyses inventory behaviour alongside sales performance to flag those products, then guides your store colleagues through verifying the shelf.
What is on-shelf availability?
On-shelf availability, usually shortened to OSA, is the proportion of products a customer can find and buy when they come looking for them. It differs from in-stock levels, which measure what your system believes you’re holding. A store can report healthy stock on hand and poor on-shelf availability at the same time.
What is OSA in retail?
OSA stands for on-shelf availability. It’s measured from the shopper’s perspective rather than from the stock file. A product sitting in the back room, mis-merchandised, or recorded but missing doesn’t count as available to that shopper.
What is a stock discrepancy?
A stock discrepancy is any difference between your recorded stock and your physical stock. Phantom inventory is the specific direction of that gap where the file overstates what’s actually there. That’s the direction that costs you sales, because it suppresses replenishment rather than triggering it.
How do you handle discrepancies in inventory records?
Investigating every discrepancy isn’t realistic in a live store, so the question is which ones to work first. Prioritising by revenue impact puts colleague time on the products where a correction recovers the most sales. Availability Checker builds that prioritised list, guides the check, records the outcome and updates the stock file, so each investigation ends in a corrected record and a full audit trail.
How do you measure inventory accuracy?
Inventory accuracy compares counted units against recorded units and is typically expressed as a percentage. Regular, targeted checks focused on products flagged by data rather than generic routines are more effective at maintaining accuracy than periodic full counts.