Operations Manager — Daily, Weekly & Monthly Routine SOP

Purpose

This SOP defines every recurring duty of the Operations Manager, the deadline attached to each, and the KPI each one feeds. All six tasks are generated automatically at 06:00 SAST on working days from VB Task Template records. Closing a task with a comment is what scores it — a task ticked closed with no comment scores nothing.

Daily — two tasks, both due 16:00

1. System Health Check & Daily Operations Report (High, 45 min)

1. Confirm the overnight automations ran: bank feed sync, Takealot daily sync, Shopify sync.
2. Check for documents left in draft that should have been submitted.
3. Check stock alerts and any negative stock balances.
4. Close the task with a comment summarising what you found and what you actioned.

2. Complete Own Ad-Hoc & Incidental Tasks (Medium, 1 hr)

Covers approvals, queries and anything raised during the day that is not part of a fixed routine. Close with a comment listing what was handled.

Feeds: Task Efficiency (40%) and Reporting & Communication (5%).

Weekly — two tasks, both raised Monday

3. Warehouse Stock Take Report vs Actual Count (High, 90 min, due Monday 12:00)

1. The comparison is built automatically before you start — this is a review job, not data entry.
2. Open the latest VB Stock Take record and read the three accuracy figures: SKU, units and value.
3. Work through every variance line. Establish the cause before proposing any correction.
4. Report accuracy, not discrepancy. Positive framing is required.
5. Do not post a Stock Reconciliation. No stock correction may be posted until the cause is understood and Tsakane or Chomba has approved it.

A variance is not proof of a miscount. Just as often it is stock that left the warehouse without being booked out. A persistent one-directional gap on the same SKUs points to unbooked movement and must be traced physically.

4. Supplier Invoices, Raw Material & Final Product Intake (High, 90 min, due Monday 16:00)

1. Match every draft Purchase Invoice to its Purchase Order and Purchase Receipt.
2. Chase any supplier Purchase Order past its expected date.
3. Confirm raw material cover for the coming production run. Production must never run short.
4. Confirm finished goods intake was received and booked into the correct warehouse.

Feeds: Stock Accuracy, Availability & Production Oversight (40%).

Skipped automatically if you are on approved leave for the whole week, so your own score is never damaged by leave.

Monthly — two tasks

5. Payroll Roll-Over — Review & Submit Payslips (High, 4 hrs, raised 1st, due 26th)

See Monthly Payroll SOP — 8 Step Process for the detail. In summary: confirm a Salary Slip exists for every employee on payroll, check each slip against Sage to the cent, run the payroll Journal Entry generator in dry-run and confirm it reports BALANCED, send the debit/credit table to Tsakane and Chomba for approval, create the three DRAFT journals only after approval, then roll the payroll over to the following month.

Never submit a Journal Entry yourself. Drafts only. A posted journal is hard to reverse.

6. Pay UIF, SDL, PAYE & Retirement Fund (High, 2 hrs, raised 26th, due 7th of the next month)

Statutory deadline is the 7th. Missing it is a statutory breach — escalate to Chomba immediately if payment cannot be made in time.

Feeds: Payroll Roll-Over & Compliance (5%). Scored all or nothing.

Scoring rules that matter

• A task is overdue the moment its due time passes. Closing it later still records it as late.
• Public holidays are respected — a Monday task carries to the first working day of that week.
• Approved leave redirects the task to your duty holder, so your working-day denominator stays honest.
• Vacant or placeholder employee records are excluded from payroll scoring, so an unfilled position never counts against you.

Edit these six duties at /app/vb-task-template. They are generated by the VB Ops Task Scheduler at 06:00 SAST, Monday to Friday.