Royal Army College

Lesson Overview

Stores arrive. A delivery comes in from a supplier, a consignment comes down from a higher store, a return comes back from a team that has finished a task, and at that moment the account is at its most exposed. Everything the earlier lessons taught about holding an account honestly rests on a quieter discipline that happens at the door: the careful receipt, inspection, and acceptance of what comes in, before any of it is signed for, posted to the ledger, or put on a shelf. The Quartermaster NCO who waves a delivery through on the strength of the paperwork, signs the note, and brings the lot to account unchecked has just adopted whatever is wrong with it, the short quantity, the wrong item, the damaged radio, the expired batch, and made it their own discrepancy to explain. Receipt is the account's front gate, and the QM NCO is the one who decides what gets through.

This lesson is about getting that gate right. It takes the receiving process as a deliberate, ordered sequence rather than a formality: checking what arrived against what was demanded and what the delivery note claims, inspecting the goods for quantity, correctness, and condition, and only then accepting them, which is the moment responsibility passes and the stores become yours. It treats the difference between a delivery note and acceptance as a thing a QM NCO must never blur, because signing for receipt is not the same as accepting that the goods are right. And it deals plainly with what to do when something is wrong, the short, the surplus, the damaged, the incorrect, and the faulty, linking the rejection and return of bad goods back to the supplier discipline of LOG 220 and the bringing-to-account of good ones forward to the ledger work of LOG 201.

This is the knowledge layer. The hands-on receiving work behind it, opening a consignment, checking it against the demand and the delivery note, inspecting condition, raising a discrepancy report, segregating a rejected item, and posting an accepted one to the account, is practised and signed off in person where supervision allows, on real deliveries and real documents, because a gate is only as good as the check that stands at it. By the end you will be able to run a receipt as an ordered sequence of check, inspect, and accept; distinguish a delivery note from acceptance and explain why the QM NCO signs only for what has actually been verified; inspect a consignment for quantity, correctness, and condition and decide what to do with a short, a surplus, a damaged, an incorrect, or a faulty item; raise a discrepancy report and manage the rejection and return of bad goods against LOG 220; and bring accepted stores to account promptly so the ledger is true and the new stock is usable.

Key Terms

Receipt: the whole process of taking stores in, checking, inspecting, accepting or rejecting, and bringing the accepted goods to account. The point at which the QM NCO controls what enters the account.
Delivery note (consignment note): the document that travels with a delivery and states what the sender claims is in it. It is a claim to be checked, not a fact to be trusted, and signing it acknowledges arrival, not correctness.
Inspection: the deliberate check of a consignment for three things, quantity (how many), correctness (the right item), and condition (serviceable, undamaged, and in date), done before acceptance.
Acceptance: the decision, made after inspection, that the goods are right and are taken onto the account. Acceptance is where responsibility passes to the receiving store, so it is given only for what has been verified.
Bringing to account: posting accepted stores to the ledger or asset register at once, so the account reflects what is physically held without delay.
Discrepancy: any difference between what was demanded, what the delivery note claims, and what actually arrived: a shortage, a surplus, a wrong item, or a damaged or out-of-condition one.
Discrepancy report: the record raised when a receipt does not match, stating what was wrong, used to recover the shortfall, return the bad goods, and correct the account honestly.
Rejection: the refusal to accept goods that are wrong, damaged, faulty, or out of condition, which keeps them off the account and triggers their return to the supplier (LOG 220).
The three-way match: the check that the demand (what was ordered), the delivery note (what was sent), and the physical goods (what arrived) all agree before acceptance and before any payment is approved (LOG 220).
Quarantine (holding area): a separated area where a consignment under check, or a rejected or suspect item, is held apart from the accepted account so nothing unchecked or unfit is issued by mistake.

Why receipt is a QM NCO responsibility

It is tempting to treat receiving as a storekeeper's chore, a matter of counting boxes and signing a note, and to keep the QM NCO's attention for the larger questions of the account. That is a mistake, because the receipt is where the larger questions are decided. Every error that ever appears in a stocktake, every unserviceable item found on the shelf, every expired batch issued by accident, had a moment when it could have been caught, and that moment was the door. An account is not kept honest mainly by counting it carefully later; it is kept honest by being careful about what is allowed onto it in the first place. The QM NCO sets the receiving standard, supervises it, and personally handles the receipts that matter, the high-value, the controlled, the consignment that does not look right.

The reason the QM NCO cannot delegate the standard is the same maxim that runs through this whole course: you sign for it, you own it. When a consignment is accepted, its problems become the receiving store's problems. A shortage accepted unchecked is a shortage the QM NCO will be short of at the next audit, with no recourse to the supplier because the note was signed clean. A damaged item accepted as serviceable is an item that will fail a team in the field and a discrepancy that cannot now be pinned on the sender. Acceptance is a transfer of responsibility, and a QM NCO who understands that treats the moment before acceptance as the one chance to refuse what is wrong while refusing it still costs nothing.

The receiving sequence: check, inspect, accept

A good receipt is an ordered sequence, and the order matters because each step protects the next. The QM NCO does not put goods away and check them afterwards, and does not sign first and look later. The sequence is check the paperwork, inspect the goods, then accept, in that order, with nothing brought to account until the end.

Check. Begin with the documents and the three-way match. What was demanded? What does the delivery note claim was sent? Lay them side by side before a single box is opened, because you cannot tell whether a delivery is right until you know what right would be. Confirm the consignment is for you, that it answers a demand you raised, and that the delivery note matches that demand. A delivery that does not match the demand is a flag before anything is even unpacked.

Inspect. Now open the consignment and inspect it against three questions. Quantity: count what is physically there against the note and the demand, every line, not a glance at the total. Correctness: is it the right item, the right specification, the right variant, not a near-substitute that will not do the job? Condition: is each item serviceable, undamaged, complete with its accessories, and, for anything perishable or shelf-lifed, in date with enough life left to be useful? Controlled and high-value items are checked individually by serial number, as Lesson 05 taught, not counted as a quantity. Inspection is done in a holding area kept apart from the live account, so that nothing under check can be issued as though it were already accepted.

Accept. Only when the consignment has passed all three checks does the QM NCO accept it. Acceptance is the deliberate decision that the goods are right and are taken onto the account, and it is the moment responsibility passes. What is accepted is brought to account at once, posted to the ledger or the asset register, so the physical holding and the record agree from the first hour. What fails any check is not accepted; it is held in quarantine, recorded on a discrepancy report, and dealt with as the next section describes. The signature on the delivery note, where one is given, records only what was actually received and accepted, with any shortage or fault noted on it before signing, never a clean signature over a dirty delivery.

  THE RECEIVING SEQUENCE   (check -> inspect -> accept; nothing
                            to account until the end)

  CONSIGNMENT ARRIVES  (supplier / higher store / returned from a team)
        |
   1. CHECK (paper)  ...... three-way match BEFORE opening
        |   DEMAND (ordered) = DELIVERY NOTE (sent) = ?
        |   is it even for us? does the note answer our demand?
        v
   2. INSPECT (goods) ..... open it; check every line for:
        |   QUANTITY     count vs note + demand (not the total)
        |   CORRECTNESS  right item/spec, not a substitute
        |   CONDITION    serviceable, undamaged, complete, IN DATE
        |   (controlled/high-value: check by SERIAL, one by one)
        |   -- done in a QUARANTINE / holding area, off the account --
        v
   3. ACCEPT (decision) ... only if all three pass
        |
        +--> PASS  -> ACCEPT -> bring to account NOW (ledger/register)
        |             sign the note for what was ACTUALLY received
        |
        +--> FAIL  -> do NOT accept -> hold in quarantine
                      -> raise a DISCREPANCY REPORT (next section)

  RULE: signing for arrival is NOT accepting it is right. Note every
        short / fault on the document BEFORE you sign, or not at all.

When something is wrong

Much of the value of a careful receipt shows only when a delivery is not right, because that is when the discipline either recovers the loss or eats it. The QM NCO meets five common kinds of wrong, and each has a plain answer.

Short: fewer arrived than the note claims or the demand required. Note the shortage on the delivery note before signing, raise a discrepancy report, and pursue the shortfall with the supplier or sender. Bring to account only what actually arrived, never the figure on the note, because posting the claimed quantity creates a phantom holding you will be short of later.
Surplus: more arrived than was demanded or noted. A surplus is not a windfall to absorb quietly; it is a discrepancy. Record it, query it with the sender, and either return it or bring it formally to account against proper authority, because unrecorded extra stock is as much a break in the account's truth as a shortage.
Damaged: the item arrived broken, crushed, wet, or otherwise harmed in transit. Do not accept it as serviceable. Record the damage, photograph or witness it where it matters, hold it in quarantine, and return or claim against the supplier under LOG 220, because a damaged item accepted clean becomes your loss to write off.
Incorrect: the wrong item, specification, or variant arrived. A near-substitute is still wrong if it will not do the job the demand specified. Reject it, record it, and pursue the correct item, rather than accepting something that will fail a team because it was easier than sending it back.
Faulty: the item is the right thing and undamaged in transit but does not work, a radio that will not power, a tool dead from the box. This is the warranty and supplier-performance ground of LOG 220: reject, record, and return for repair or replacement under the agreement, and never let a faulty item drift onto the shelf to be discovered by the team that needed it.

Across all five, the discipline is the same: do not accept what is wrong, record it on a discrepancy report, segregate it in quarantine so it cannot be issued by mistake, and bring to account only the good stores that actually arrived. The discrepancy report is the instrument that turns a problem into a recovery, the basis on which the supplier replaces the short, refunds the damaged, or corrects the incorrect, and it is also the honest mark on the account that says what was really received. A receipt closed with every discrepancy recorded is a receipt that protected both the force and the account; a receipt waved through to save half an hour is a future stocktake discrepancy with nobody left to blame.

  WHAT ARRIVED vs WHAT WAS RIGHT   (five wrongs, one discipline)

  WRONG          DO NOT...            DO INSTEAD
  -----          -------              ----------
  SHORT          post the noted qty   note on the note, discrepancy
                                      report, chase the shortfall;
                                      account ONLY what arrived
  SURPLUS        absorb it quietly    record + query; return or bring
                                      to account vs authority
  DAMAGED        accept as good       quarantine, record, claim/return
                                      to supplier (LOG 220)
  INCORRECT      keep the substitute  reject, record, get the right item
  FAULTY         shelve it "for now"  reject, record, repair/replace
                                      under warranty (LOG 220)

  ALWAYS: do not accept the wrong; raise a DISCREPANCY REPORT;
          QUARANTINE the bad; bring to account ONLY the good.

In Practice: A delivery that did not add up

A Quartermaster NCO, a Corporal, receives a consignment of field equipment from a supplier against a demand the detachment raised three weeks earlier: forty headtorches, eight handheld radios, and a pallet of batteries. The delivery driver is in a hurry and pushes the note across for a signature so he can be away. The Corporal does not sign it. He lays the delivery note next to his copy of the demand and checks the match first: the note claims the right items and quantities, so far so good, but a claim on paper is not stores on a shelf.

He moves the consignment into the receiving bay, which he keeps separate from the live racking precisely so nothing under check gets issued by accident, and he inspects. The headtorches count correct and work. The batteries are the right type and, checking the print on the cells, in date with years of life left. The radios are where the receipt earns its keep. He checks them by serial number, one to eight, as the equipment lesson taught, and finds only seven in the box; the eighth, listed on the note, is not there. Of the seven, one powers up but will not hold a charge, faulty from the box rather than damaged in transit. So he handles each problem by its kind. The short radio he marks on the delivery note as received seven of eight, raises a discrepancy report, and will pursue with the supplier; he does not sign for eight. The faulty radio he sets aside in quarantine, records on the same report, and will return for replacement under the supplier agreement from LOG 220; he does not shelve it to sort out later. Then he brings to account exactly what he accepted, forty torches, six serviceable radios brought on by serial, the batteries, and signs the note for that and only that, with the shortage and the fault noted on it.

It cost him forty minutes the driver did not want to give. The reward comes weeks later at the stocktake, when his radio holding matches his ledger to the item because he never posted a radio he did not have, and again when the replacement radio arrives free under warranty because he had a dated discrepancy report and a clean refusal to point to. The QM NCO down the corridor who signs deliveries on trust to keep the drivers happy is the one who finds himself two radios short at audit with no recourse, having accepted, weeks ago and without looking, exactly the problems the Corporal sent back.

Check Your Understanding

Explain the difference between signing a delivery note and accepting stores, and why a QM NCO must never blur the two. What passes at the moment of acceptance, and why does that make the inspection before it the one chance that matters?
Set out the receiving sequence of check, inspect, and accept, and explain why the order matters and why nothing is brought to account until the end. What three things does inspection check, and how is a controlled or high-value item inspected differently from a bulk commodity?
Take three of the five kinds of wrong delivery (short, surplus, damaged, incorrect, faulty) and explain, for each, what the QM NCO records, what is brought to account, and how the problem is recovered. Why is bringing to account only what actually arrived, rather than what the note claims, the rule in every case?

Reflection (write a short paragraph): A careful receipt almost always costs time that the person delivering, and sometimes the QM NCO's own team, would rather not spend, and its payoff is invisible because it shows up as problems that never happen: the stocktake that matches, the warranty claim that succeeds, the faulty item that never reached a team. Write about why a QM NCO should hold the receiving standard firmly even when nobody is thanking them for it, and what that says about where the real work of an honest account is done.

Summary

Receipt is the account's front gate: the careful check, inspection, and acceptance of what comes in. The QM NCO controls what is allowed onto the account, because every later discrepancy had a moment at the door when it could have been refused.
Run a receipt as an ordered sequence: check the paperwork with the three-way match (demand = delivery note = goods) before opening, inspect for quantity, correctness, and condition in a quarantine area off the live account, and only then accept and bring to account.
Signing a delivery note acknowledges arrival; acceptance is the separate decision that the goods are right and the moment responsibility passes to your store. Sign only for what was actually received, with every shortage and fault noted first.
When something is wrong, do not accept it: short, surplus, damaged, incorrect, and faulty each get recorded on a discrepancy report, the bad goods quarantined and returned or claimed under LOG 220, and only the good stores that actually arrived brought to account.
Bring accepted stores to account promptly so the physical holding and the ledger agree from the first hour, and never post a claimed quantity you did not verify, because a phantom receipt is a future stocktake shortage with no recourse.
Cross-references: applies the bring-to-account, ledger, and shelf-life discipline of LOG 201 (Stores, Equipment, and Accountability); checks controlled and high-value items by serial as in LOG 310 Lesson 05 (Equipment Management and Maintenance Oversight); runs the three-way match and the rejection, return, and warranty recovery of LOG 220 (Procurement and Supply Administration); and feeds the integrity standard of LOG 310 Lesson 10, since an account is kept true at the door as much as at the stocktake.

Receipt, Inspection, and Acceptance of Stores