Purpose
A rebate is a special discount which is paid retroactively to a customer. This discount is based on the customer's sales volume over a specified time period.
You define the details of the rebate in a rebate agreement. In the agreement you specify, for example
Within the rebate agreement you create separate condition records for each product the customer buys. These records specify the rebate amount or percentage for each product. You can also specify a pricing scale so that the customer can earn a better rebate by ordering more. Because rebates are always paid retroactively, the system keeps track of all billing documents (invoices, credit and debit memos) that are relevant for rebate processing. The system can, if you wish, automatically post accruals so that the accumulated value of a rebate is recorded for accounting purposes.
A rebate agreement is finally settled when you issue a credit memo to the customer for the accumulated rebate total.
You can set up rebates at any level just like pricing. The following rebates have been set up in the standard version of the SAP R/3 system:
Prerequisites for Processing Rebates
You can process rebate agreements when the following prerequisite conditions are met:
If you plan to create rebates that do not depend on a material, but instead, for example, depend only on the customer, you must create a special material master record for a settlement material.
Relationship to Pricing
Rebates differ from other kinds of discounts in that they are based on sales volume over time and are paid retroactively. However, the system processes rebates in much the same way as other kinds of pricing elements. Rebate data is saved in condition records. Controlling for rebate processing is carried out via condition types, pricing procedures and access sequences. This control data is defined in Customizing for Sales and Distribution.