Agent 

Definition

The specific or potential negative effect of a physical, chemical, biological, or other nature on the health and wellbeing of persons in a company.

SAP also uses the term to refer to hazards.

Agents have the specification category “agent.” Depending on the Customizing settings for the agent type, agents can also be specifications, materials, or tasks, for example. Examples of agents are:

·        UV radiation

·        Lifting loads

·        Mechanical hazard caused by lack of safety barrier

·        Butyl alcohol

Structure

Agent Type

An agent is identified in the system by its agent type (for example, real substance, noise, lifting loads) and the agent key.

The settings in Customizing for the agent type determine which higher-level object type it has. An agent can, for example, be a specification, a material, or a task from the Organizational Management (PA-OS) component.

When you assign an agent to a work area, the system calls the input help for the respective object type. The same applies to the display of descriptions and for existence checks. For more information on agent types, see Specify Agent Types and Assign Functions to Agent Types in the Implementation Guide (IMG) for Industrial Hygiene and Safety.

Agent Data

The data for agents that refers to specifications is managed with the aid of the specification database (see Exposure Management).

If the required settings for the specification exist in Customizing, you can assign materials to an agent (for example, to a real substance). The system can, for example, evaluate this assignment when determining amounts and when creating a hazardous substance inventory. The prerequisite for material assignment is that the indicator that permits the material assignment is set in Customizing for the respective agent type.

Agents that are not specifications are not managed in the specification database but in the respective application component (such as Materials Management (MM)). By means of integration with Industrial Hygiene and Safety, you can still include them in your company exposure log, assess their risk potential, and store additional information – such as information on safe handling.

Integration

For specifications of agents that are quantifiable by measurements, you can plan and perform measurements in the measurement management (EHS-IHS-MEM) component. If no measurement project was created, you can also enter the measured values in the risk assessment(EHS-IHS-RSK) component.

Independent of where they were initially entered in the system, in the standard system all measured values are stored as amounts for the respective work area. For more information, see Entry of Values Using Amounts and the IMG for Industrial Hygiene and Safety under BAdI: Transfer of Measured Values to Amounts.