Store - CLASSIFICATION, CODIFICATION AND NOMENCLATURE OF STORES ON INDIAN RAILWAYS

3.1.0 General Classification of Stores:

Stores Department on Indian Railways is required to give a service to various departments by making thousands of items available to their indenters as and when required. To give this service we have to maintain stocks of a large number of items called as "Stock items" whereas for other items which are not frequently required or are of one time requirement, no stocks are maintained. These items are purchased as and when required to meet specific demands and are called as `Non-stock items'. The stock items are further classified as under:

3.1.1 Ordinary Stores : These are generally such items of stores for which there is a regularturnover caused by a constant demand. These may be further subdivided as 

• New, 
• Second hand
• Serviceable and
• Second hand repairable.

3.1.2 Emergency Stores : The Stores depots are also required to stock certain items of stores even though they do not have a regular turnover. These are emergency stores and comprise of items which do not ordinarily wear out or require renewal but which are required to be kept in stock to meet emergency due to breakage or unanticipated deterioration.

• These items are not readily available in the market and as such would require a long time for procurement in case they are not stocked. These are generally components of imported machines and Rolling Stock.

3.1.3 Surplus Stores : These are the items of ordinary stock which are not demanded by the users. If any item is not issued for past 24 months or more, it is declared as surplus. Surplus stores are further classified as dead surplus and movable surplus.

a. Dead Surplus Stores : These are the items which have not been issued to any indentor during past 24 months or more and are not likely to be utilized on any Railway within next 2 years

b. Movable Surplus Stores: These are the items which have not been issued to any indentor during past 24 months but their use in near future (within 24 months) is anticipated.

3.1.4 Special Stores : The items of stores arranged and stocked for works and other special purposes i.e. other than for operation or ordinary maintenance and repairs are called "Special Stores". These are kept separate from ordinary stores and issued to the work for which they have been arranged.

3.2.0 Other Classification Of Stores :

Apart from above some other classifications as under are also prevalent on Indian Railways.

3.2.1 Custody Stores : These are stores which have been purchased for special works and charged to such works but due to inadequate stocking facilities available with user/indentor have been kept in the custody of stores department. These are generally non- stock items but in certain situations stock items also may be under this classification.

3.2.2 Imprest Stores : Certain important units like loco sheds, train examining depots etc require a large number of items for day to day repairs, maintenance and operation of rolling stock. Such items include consumable stores like cotton wastes, oils, greases etc. as well as the spares required for rolling stock.

• The senior supervisor in-charge of the unit like running sheds, Train Examining Depots, Chief Signal Inspector, Electric Foreman etc. are allowed to maintain stocks of nominated items of stores. The limits up to which the stocks are to be kept are also specified while sanctioning such items and are generally fixed as equivalent to two or three months' requirement.
• Imprest stores are standing advance of materials to meet the day to day requirement of repairs maintenance and operation of rolling stock etc. On most Railways the Imprest stores are charged off to the final head of Account under revenue working expenses. However, detailed A/c are maintained by these units and monthly Imprest recoupment schedules are sent by the Imprest holders to the nominated stores depots for bringing their stocks to the Imprest level sanctioned.

3.2.3 Standard And Non-Standard Items : Most of the items used on Indian Railways have been standardized i.e. their description, dimensions and specifications have been made standard and also a standard code no. has been allotted for easy identification. However, still there may be few items which have not been standardized and therefore obviously no code no. has been allotted for them. Such items are known as Non- Standard items.

• A non-standard item will necessarily be a non-stock item but all standard items are not stock items i.e. an item which has been allotted a code no. may still be a non- stock item.

3.3.0 Codification Of Stores :

In order to recognize every item distinctly, all standard items being used on Railways, have been allotted a code number, which is also known as Price List (PL) No. These Nos. enable unique identification of items and as a result of extensive standardization all over the Railways, enable easy exchange of information among nine Railway Zones and six Production Units. While allotting these numbers, an opportunity has been taken to group the items in a meaningful manner so that group-wise analysis of materials is also facilitated.

We can have three types of codification systems ; 

• Fully significant, 
• Semi-significant and
• Non-significant.
• In fully significant system, all the digits of the code signify some property of the material while in a non-significant system, digits have no significance and one can not guess anything about material by seeing only code no. Obviously if we have large number of items developing fully significant system will require a large no. of digits which may not be manageable.
• Therefore in Railways we have designed a 8 digit semi-significant coding system in which first 4 digits signify some property of the material while other 4 digits are non- significant. This code No. is known as Price List No. or PL NO.

3.3.1 All the Railway materials have been classified in 76 `Major Groups' or 'Main Groups' or groups. Each Major/main group (or groups) has been further classified into several sub- groups. Great car has been taken to ensure that groups and sub-groups do not overlap and the numbers have been allotted in a meaningful order and also they are unique.

3.3.2 Each PL No. is sub-divided into 4 parts as under ;

90 35 058 3

Part A -- First Two Digits

Part B -- Third and fourth digit

Part C-- Fifth , Sixth and seventh digit

Part D-- Last digit

Part `A' consists of two digits representing the main group of stores to which the item belongs. in the present example main group is `90' which is for steel items.

Part `B' consists of two digits representing sub-group. Each group has been further divided into sub-groups. Here `35' is the sub-group which is for various sizes of Mild Steel Flats.

• The sub-grouping for the most of rolling stock groups is on the basis of  major assemblies of which the item is a part

Part `C' consists of 3 digits and is the serial number of the item within the sub group. No significance is attached to this number. In the above example serial number is 58.

Part `D' consists of one digit which has a special significance with reference to computerization. This is the check digit. This digit is unique to a given number and is intended to check the integrity of the code number.

3.3.3 Method of verifying P.L. NO :

Wherever the computer encounters a code No. during processing, it calculates the check digit on the basis of modulas 11 and checks if the calculated digit tallies with the check digit shown on the document and punched. If the two do not tally, the voucher is rejected. 

Method :Calculation method is given below. 

 CHECK DIGIT : DATA VALIDATION WHILE PROCESSING;

( BASED ON MODULAS 11)

1. WRITE 2 TO 8 BELOW EACH DIGIT OF CODE FROM RIGHT TO LEFT EXCEPT  CHECK DIGIT,

2. MULTIPLY THE DIGITS VERTICALLY &

3. ADD PRODUCTS OF MULTIPLICATION HORIZONTALLY,

4. DIVIDE THE SUM OF PRODUCTS BY 11,

5. THE REMAINDER OF DIVISION IS CHECK DIGIT

(RIGHT MOST DIGIT IF YOU GET 2-Digit REMAINDER)

Sample Check digit calculation :

2 5 1 6 1 0 4 ?

X X X X X X X

8 7 6 5 4 3 2 - 16 + 35 + 6 + 30 + 4 + 0 + 8 = 99

99/11 = 11*9 + 0 , i.e. Remainder = 0

Therefore, Check digit = 0

 MAIN GROUPS CODES

3.3.4 Unification of P.L. NO: A Price List number may be either unified or non- unified. If a Price List number for an item is unified, all the Railways and Production unit uses same number as PL code for this item. This facilitates easy exchange of information between the Railways. Disposal of surplus stores and centralized purchase become easier. In case of non- unified Price List numbers, all the Railways do not use same code for the same item. Our attempt is always to have unified Price List numbers.

3.4.0 Nomenclature Lists :

3.4.1 It is not easy for the indentors to remember codes for all the items which are likely to be required by them. As a stock item can not be indented without quoting Price List number in the requisition, Major group wise Nomenclature lists (popularly known as PL books) have been printed for all the items classified in a Major group.

This list contains 

• Code number, 
• Description, 
• Specification, 
• Unit of accountal and
• Details of Railways and depots where the item is stocked.

These books have been distributed to all the departments and indentors. The nomenclature list (PL book) of which all the items are unified, is known as unified nomenclature list.

3.4.1.1 Description Of Stores : The basic commodity method has been adopted in describing an item. In this system the mention of the basic commodity precedes the detailed description of the item.

• For example "ordinary toilet soap" would, under the method, be described as "Soap, Toilet, ordinary" because the basic commodity is soap. The word "toilet" specifies the kind of that commodity and "ordinary" further qualifies the toilet variety.
• If the basic commodity method is not used, the different kinds of soaps will find themselves listed in different places. In short the description should be arranged in the following order of precedence :

1. The mention of the basic commodity

2. The general variance in kind, use size or shape

3. The particular kind or size.

4. The specification / drawing.

A few instances of how the items would have been described in P.L. books are :

3.4.2 End Use Of Item : Against some items, the purpose for which the items are used, is incorporated in the nomenclature list. For instance there are numerous grades of lubricating oils stocked and used for various purposes. This information is briefly mentioned in the nomenclature list as a part of the description , say in remarks column, as this will greatly help the consumer.

3.4.3 Mention Of Makers' Name : The commercial brand or the proprietary make of the item will be avoided in the description unless the item is of proprietary nature. The description of the basic commodity only will find a place in nomenclature list.

3.4.4 Specification Or Drawing : Reference to a standard specification or in its absence the Railway's drawing, if any, will be mentioned against each description. Such specification and drawing references are not only useful to suppliers, including Railway manufacturing shops but also assist the stores Department in the purchase as well as inspection of supplies.

3.4.5 The Unit : It is desirable that for a particular item, all references should confirm to one and the same unit, as this will avoid unnecessary references and would also facilitate issues and receipts eliminating arithmetical errors in conversion from one unit to another. The unit code has been indicated in a separate column of the PL Book. Unit Code consists of 2 digits.