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Traceability in Batchlane is the ability to answer two questions: “Where did this ingredient go?” and “Where did this finished product come from?” Because Batchlane records lot-level inputs and outputs on every batch record, traceability is a natural byproduct of your daily operations — not a separate audit system you have to populate. Every time an operator confirms a lot in a batch record, a link is created between that ingredient lot and the resulting finished lot. Those links accumulate into a complete genealogy you can query at any time.

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Two Traceability Directions

Forward Trace

Start from an ingredient or packaging lot and follow it forward:
  • Which batch records consumed this lot?
  • Which finished lots were produced in those runs?
  • Which customer shipments included those finished lots?
Forward tracing is used when you identify a problem with an incoming ingredient — a supplier recall, a failed COA, or a quality deviation — and need to know which finished goods and customers are affected.

Backward Trace

Start from a finished lot or customer shipment and follow it backward:
  • Which batch record produced this finished lot?
  • Which input lots were consumed in that run?
  • Which suppliers provided those input lots?
Backward tracing is used when a customer reports a quality issue, when you’re preparing documentation for a buyer or auditor, or when you need to verify the ingredient provenance of a specific product.

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Running a Trace

1

Go to the Inventory or Lots view

Open the Inventory section from the left navigation and select the Lots tab. You can search by lot number, item name, supplier, or date range to find the lot you want to trace.
2

Select the lot

Click on the lot row to open the lot detail panel. Here you can see the lot’s full profile: quantity, expiry, COA status, cost, and movement history.
3

Open the Genealogy view

Inside the lot detail panel, select the Genealogy tab. Batchlane builds and displays the full trace graph for this lot — upstream ingredient lots (if it’s a finished lot) or downstream finished lots and shipments (if it’s an ingredient lot).
4

Review linked batch records and shipments

Each node in the genealogy view links to the underlying document — batch record, receiving record, or shipment. Click any node to open the full document and review the details. For multi-hop traces (ingredient → finished lot → reprocessed into another product), Batchlane shows each step in the chain.
5

Export the trace

Select Export to download the complete trace as a CSV or PDF. The export includes all lot numbers, document references, quantities, dates, and supplier details — formatted for use in audit responses, regulatory submissions, or recall documentation.

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Mock Recalls

A mock recall drill tests whether you can identify all affected finished lots and shipments from a given ingredient lot within a target time window — typically two hours for most food safety programs. Batchlane makes this straightforward: select any ingredient lot, run a forward trace, and review every finished lot and shipment in the chain. To run a mock recall in Batchlane:
  1. Select an ingredient lot from a past receiving period
  2. Open the Genealogy view and run a forward trace
  3. Identify all finished lots produced from that ingredient lot
  4. Identify all customer shipments containing those finished lots
  5. Export the trace as a PDF and record the time taken
  6. File the export in your food safety records as evidence of the drill
Run a mock recall drill at least once per quarter, rotating through different ingredient categories each time (e.g., proteins one quarter, dry goods the next). Regular drills surface gaps in your lot number discipline — such as missing lot assignments on older batch records — before an actual recall makes them urgent.

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Customer Shipment Lookup

When a customer contacts you with a quality concern about a specific product, you need to quickly identify which ingredient lots went into it. In Batchlane, search for the customer’s shipment or the finished lot code on the packaging. Open the Genealogy view and run a backward trace to retrieve:
  • The batch record that produced the finished lot
  • Every input lot consumed in that batch run
  • The supplier, receiving date, and COA status for each input lot
You can share this information directly with the customer or use it internally to determine whether the issue is isolated to one lot or potentially broader.
Full traceability with genealogy export (CSV and PDF) is available on Growth and Pro plans. The Free plan provides basic lot movement history — you can see which batch records a lot appeared in — but the full multi-hop genealogy view and export are not included. If traceability documentation is a compliance requirement for your operation, Growth or Pro is recommended.