Two people grabbing the same pick is one of those problems that sounds unlikely until it happens on a busy afternoon. In Warehouse Insight for Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, the answer depends on whether the handheld devices are online or working offline.
When devices are online
When devices are connected, every scan goes to Business Central for validation before it is accepted. If two workers open the same pick and one of them has already picked a line, the second worker gets immediate feedback that the action is no longer valid. There are no silent collisions, because Business Central remains the single source of truth for what has and has not been picked.
You can also stop the situation before it starts. Warehouse Insight includes a setting that automatically assigns a pick to the worker who starts it. A related setting hides assigned picks from everyone else’s list. With both enabled, when one worker opens pick number four, it becomes theirs, and other workers may not even see it on their screens. That keeps your pickers moving through their own work instead of stepping on each other.
When devices are offline
Offline mode works differently by design. When a device loses its connection, it captures scans locally and queues them for transmission. While offline, devices cannot communicate with Business Central or with each other. That means two offline workers can open the same pick and both pick the same product, because there is no way for either device to know the other one has already done the work.
The queued transactions sync once each device reconnects. Business Central then processes each transaction as it arrives. Anything that cannot be posted is written to an error log in Business Central and reported back to the handheld device. Even when every transaction posts, a supervisor should check for duplicated work after an offline period, because Business Central had no way to stop both workers while they were disconnected.
Why offline should stay a safety net
Offline capability exists for emergency situations, such as a Wi-Fi outage or a power failure. It is not a substitute for reliable wireless coverage. The automatic pick assignment and real-time validation that prevent double picking only work when devices can talk to Business Central. If your team is regularly working offline, the better fix is improving Wi-Fi coverage in the facility rather than relying on the device to clean up conflicts after the fact.
Practical recommendations
Enable automatic pick assignment so the first worker to open a pick owns it.
Hide assigned picks from other users so workers only see work that is available to them.
Treat offline mode as a backup for outages, not as a normal operating mode.
Assign someone to review the Business Central sync error log after any offline period.
Invest in Wi-Fi coverage for problem areas instead of working around them.
Bottom line
Online, real-time validation in Business Central stops two workers from completing the same pick lines, and pick assignment keeps the work separated from the start. Offline, those protections are not available, so duplicate picking is possible and must be resolved after the devices sync. Keeping devices connected is the most reliable way to avoid the problem altogether.