Consignment goods are stored within your company but belong to a vendor. The vendor supplies these goods so that they are available to you at any time, but does not charge you for them. Only when you have withdrawn stock does payment become due for the quantities used.

A pipeline material is a material which flows directly from a pipeline (such as an oil pipeline), a pipe (such as a water pipe), or any other type of line (such as an electricity connection) into the production process. Every time material is consumed, payment is due for the liability.

You do not receive invoices from the vendor for consignment materials or materials withdrawn from the pipeline, but settle the withdrawals posted yourself and send the vendor a statement. You can settle pipeline and consignment liabilities periodically in the background.

Consignment settlement is integrated with message determination, allowing your to define a layout set for settlement in Customizing. Whenever you run the settlement program, the system generates a message record that fills the layout set. Depending on how your system is configured, you can either send the form directly to the vendor when you post or at a later point.