Alternate Appropriation Requests 

Use

You can represent different ways of implementing an appropriation request by using appropriation request variants). However, if the different investment alternatives are of a completely different nature, it is possible that the functions for variants may not be sufficient for depicting their differences.

You are trying to decide whether to build a plant in Spain or in Mexico. The basic conditions for each scenario are extremely different.

One of the reasons for this is that certain master data can only be maintained for the appropriation request as a whole, rather than separately for each variant. Master data that is particularly important in this respect includes:

If these assignments are different for each alternate mode of implementing the investment, then it is no longer possible to represent them in the system using a single appropriation request. Therefore, the system provides functions for representing several related appropriation requests in the form of a group of alternate appropriation requests.

Features

You use an original request to link several alternate appropriation requests together. This original request is one of the alternate appropriation requests, which the system uses as the means to link all of the alternate requests into a group. At the same time, the original request in a sense also places brackets around a set of alternate appropriation requests.

The original request is not a new system object with special features. It is just an ordinary appropriation request. As seen in relation to the other alternate appropriation requests, it is completely equal to them, and can be viewed as one of the alternates. The original request does not have a superior position in any way. However, it is usually the first that was created, among a group of several alternate requests.

Group of Alternate Requests

Maintaining Assignment

You establish the relationship of an appropriation request to an original request in the master data screen of the appropriation request. On the Measures/assets tab page you assign your appropriation request to the original request. You can enter only one original request in the master data of an appropriation request. This means that an appropriation request is permitted to belong to only one group of alternate appropriation requests. In the master record of the appropriation request, the system displays all appropriation requests that belong to its original request (that is, to its alternate group).

An appropriation request can only be assigned to an original request as long as it is not itself an original request. This means that you are not allowed to link two original requests in order to link their alternate groups together.

The individual appropriation requests in an alternate group are also required to belong to both:

C should be an alternate request of B, and B should be an alternate of A. This means that C is also an alternate of A. In order to show this type of relationship in the system, use this procedure:

Specify one of the appropriation requests as the original request ® Use A as the original request for the example.

Enter A as original request in the master data of B.

Also enter A as original request in the master data of C.

You cannot enter an original request in the master data of A, since A is itself an original request.

Planning Process

The individual appropriation requests in an alternate group each have at least one appropriation request variant. They could also have more than one. Using several variants can be helpful in order to represent various stages in the certainty of the planning, for example.

When you assign an appropriation request variant to a plan version of the investment program (refer to Versions for Planning ), the system makes sure that only one variant of an alternate group can be assigned to a plan version. In this way, the system guarantees that the plan values of an alternate group are not included more than once in investment program planning.

Approval Process

During the approval process, the system makes sure that only one alternate request from an alternate group can be approved. As soon as one of the alternate appropriation requests receives for approval status, the other alternates are prevented from receiving this status. When this appropriation request is approved and replaced by a measure, the other alternate requests in the alternate group are assigned rejected status.

Reporting

Reports can be run on the assignments of an alternate group using master data reporting for appropriation requests.