Release Procedure with Classification (Purchase Requisitions and Purchasing Documents)
The aim of this procedure is to replace manual written authorization procedures using signatures by an electronic one, while maintaining the dual control principle. The person responsible processes the purchase requisition or purchasing document in the system, thereby marking it with an “electronic signature” which can give the document legal force.
This release procedure provides for the release (approval) of purchase requisitions and the purchasing documents RFQ, purchase order, contract, scheduling agreement, and service entry sheet.
Note
Purchase requisitions are released either at item level or in their entirety. For the other purchasing documents, there is no provision for release on an item-by-item basis (partial approval). They can only be released in their entirety.
If you set up the release procedure with classification for purchase requisitions, the procedure without classification is deactivated.
Prerequisites
The release procedure with classification must be set up in Customizing for Purchasing. In addition, a class with characteristics must be created for each document (purchase requisition, purchase order, and so on).
If you wish to set up both the overall release procedure and the item-wise release procedure for requisitions, you must create a class for each procedure.
How to do this is outlined in the Implementation Guide (IMG) for Purchasing in Define Release Procedure
for the relevant documents and in Set up Release Procedure with Classification
for purchase requisitions. For more information about classification, see SAP Library in the Cross-Application Components
documentation under Classification (CA-CLC)
, sections Characteristics (CA-CL-CHR) and Classification (CA-CL).
Note
This procedure offers a wide range of possible combinations of release criteria. Should you nevertheless have other requirements, use the enhancement provided by SAP.
You can use the business function “External Release for Purchase Requisition” (LOG_MM_EXT_REL
). Once you have started an external release procedure, the affected purchase requisitions are blocked for release in SAP ERP. The release is performed in the external system. The external system transfers the result of the external release procedure to SAP ERP.