Monthly Archive for November, 2008

Purchase order pricing date

Published on November 26, 2008 in MM. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Standard purchase order pricing is based on date of purchase order creation. Some vendors let their sales prices be determined by the date on which they deliver the goods (i.e. delivery date). SAP offers standard configuration for this through Pricing date category.

Pricing date categories

Pricing date categories

The two most relevant pricing date alternatives probably are delivery date and goods receipt (GR) date. You can set this category on different locations:

  • Vendor Master – Purchasing tab (MK01)
  • Contracts – Item: Additional data tab (ME31K)
  • Inforecords – Purchasing Org Data 1 tab (ME11)

Since pricing date is usually determined per vendor, setting the pricing date category on vendor level is often sufficient as the value is copied at time of inforecord/contract creation.

Lot-size for continuous production and process industry

Published on November 25, 2008 in PP. 1 Comment Tags: , , .

A suitable lot-size for continuous production can be hard to come up with. Picture the situation of a mineral oils manufacturer that refines crude oil to 3 co-products. The planner wishes to control the process flow to align the production with demand (i.e. the refinery is not continuously refining at the same speed as it would in make-to-stock). Another requirement for ATP is that the production quantities are issued on a daily basis. Hence we want MRP to come up with weekly planned orders that are distributed on a daily basis. In abundance: 1 planned/process order per week, with equal quantities released per day.

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Consumption-based planning and MRP

Published on November 23, 2008 in MM. 3 Comments Tags: , .

MRP and Consumption-based planning are two fundamental SAP planning types that can be used to determine a product’s requirements. To avoid any confusion on the subject: I am not talking about the MRP run that is executed through MD01 and MD02. I’m talking about planning types that are set in the Material Master’s MRP1 tab. The MRP type is used in the MRP run to determine HOW procurement and/or production quantities are calculated.

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Dead stock report – MC50

Published on November 20, 2008 in MM. 5 Comments Tags: , .

The dead stock report often leads to misinterpretations. Hence a little guidance on the dead stock report.

The dead stock report analyses what part of stock is never touched in a defined period of time. If you look at the below graph you will see stock level through time.

Stock level through time

Stock level through time

In analyzing stock movement between period 1 and 5, stock never drops below 30. 30 is your dead stock. It’s the part of stock that was never touched. Now what does this tell you? That’s not easy to say:

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MRP processing keys

Published on November 19, 2008 in MM and PP. 5 Comments Tags: , , .

NETCH, NETPL and NEUPL are three fundamentally different ways to schedule your MRP run:

  • NETCH – Net Change Planning
  • NETPL – Net Change Planning within Planning Horizon
  • NEUPL – Regenerative Planning
MRP Processing Keys

MRP Processing Keys

I will elaborate on these three options and their workings:

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Different planning views

Published on November 16, 2008 in MM, PP, Process and SD. 4 Comments Tags: , , .

End-users can get confused about the difference between MD04 – Stock/requirement List and MD05 – MRP List. This post will give you the answer on when to use what report and why:

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Printing barcode labels in SAP R/3

Published on November 13, 2008 in Basis. 9 Comments Tags: , , , .

Last week I spent some time finding out how to implement barcode printing in SAP. As usual I googled the internet and a couple of alternatives were flung at me: middleware, hardware vendor applications, installing fonts, etc.

Interestingly enough there is one very simple solution: using the standard barcode font that SAP standard offers for SmartForms.  You wonder why there are so many alternatives while SAP already includes the easiest one. The main requirements for printing barcodes this way are:

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Replenishment to Maximum Stock Level

Published on November 11, 2008 in PP. 3 Comments Tags: , .
Replenishment to maximum stock level

Replenishment to maximum stock level

It is not uncommon that the use of the field Maximum Stock Level in the MRP1 tab in the Material Master leads to misinterpretations. This field can only be properly used together with lot-sizing procedure HB: Replenishment up to maximum stock level. This is commonly used for tanker planning where storage is limited to the tank capacity. This lot sizing can be used in conjunction with re-order point planning or MRP. It cannot be properly used independent of lot sizing HB as a procurement ceiling (see my suggestion at the end of this post for a way to address this).

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Change log SE16N

Published on November 11, 2008 in Basis. 1 Comment Tags: .

In SE16N you can change SAP tables directly. I explained how to in a previous post. I also warned for the risks involved in doing this. Luckily direct changes in SAP tables are also logged, so you can trace back to the culprit who messed things up. You can query the following SAP tables to report on hacks:
SE16N_CD_KEY : Change Documents – Header
SE16N_CD_DATA : Change Documents – Data

Firming types in MRP

Published on November 6, 2008 in PP. 1 Comment Tags: , .

In a production environment it may not be preferable that new requirements on the short term can influence production quantities. The length of the term can be determined by the planning time fence. How MRP treats new requirements in this period can be determined using the firming type in customizing for MRP type:

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