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  Processing External Procurement Relationships

Use

The External Procurement Relationship function enables you to check (and, if necessary, adjust) data relating to your external procurement relationships.

External procurement relationships are master data in the SCM system that make data from purchasing info records, contracts, and scheduling agreements available to that system for the planning of material procurement. In this way, you can not only reference a vendor from an external procurement order, you can also directly reference a specific item in an existing contract.

The external procurement relationship is directly linked to the relevant transportation lane and provides it with data from the purchasing info record, contract, and scheduling agreement. From the external procurement relationship, you can also branch directly to the transportation lane in order to maintain transportation lane data.

Integration

When you transfer purchasing info records, contracts, or scheduling agreements from your OLTP system via Core Interface (CIF), external procurement relationships and the associated transportation lanes are automatically created in the SCM system. In the process, a separate external procurement relationship is created for each contract item or scheduling agreement item.

For more information, see:

Prerequisites

Before you can work with external procurement relationships in the SCM system, you must transfer the following data to it from your ERP system via CIF:

  • Plants

  • Material master records

  • Vendor master records

  • Purchasing info records

  • Scheduling agreements

  • Contracts

For more information, see Integration of External Procurement Relationships .

Features

The External Procurement Relationship function enables you to display and change the external procurement relationships that exist in the SCM system and to restrict how they are used (by blocking the transportation lane, for example)-

On the initial screen for this function you define which external procurement relationships are displayed. For example: all external procurement relationships for a destination location (for example, plant 0001), all those for a source location (vendor Meyer Corp.), or all those with a certain external procurement category (”contract”).

The external procurement relationships are displayed in an overview tree in the left-hand part of the screen, listed by external procurement category (purchasing info record, contract, OLTP scheduling agreement, APO scheduling agreement) and the logical system from which the data originates.

If you choose an external procurement relationship from the overview tree, the following data will be displayed in the right-hand part of the screen:

  • General information on the external procurement relationship (such as the source and target location, the product, and the validity of the external procurement relationship)

  • Status of the external procurement relationship(active or inactive)

  • Associated transportation lanes

  • Scheduling agreement data, for example, the release creation profile (only in the case of APO scheduling agreements)

Change External Procurement Relationship

Only certain data in an external procurement relationship can be changed:

  • Change planned delivery time

  • Activate, deactivate, and delete external procurement relationship

  • Change transportation lane ( Start of the navigation path Environment Next navigation step Transportation Lane Next navigation step Maintain End of the navigation path )

  • Create new transportation lane ( Start of the navigation path Environment Next navigation step Transportation Lane Next navigation step Create End of the navigation path )

    Note Note

    You can change the priority or block the transportation lane for a transportation lane in the external procurement relationship.

    If you block an external procurement relationship then it can no longer be selected in the source determination process.

    End of the note.

If you are working with SAP Advanced Planning and Optimization (SAP APO) and the external procurement relationship relates to an APO scheduling agreement, you can also maintain the following data:

  • Release creation profile

    The release creation profile for the scheduling agreement is not transferred from the ERP system. You must create a separate release creation profile in the APO system and assign it to the external procurement relationship. You define the release creation profile in Customizing for Supply Chain Planning under Start of the navigation path Collaborative Procurement Next navigation step Maintain Release Creation Profile End of the navigation path .

  • Confirmation profile

    You define the confirmation profile in Customizing for Supply Chain Planning under Start of the navigation path Collaborative Procurement Next navigation step Maintain Release Confirmation Profiles End of the navigation path .

  • Process

    Here you can specify how confirmations are to be integrated in the scheduling agreement process.

  • Update liveCache

    When an external procurement relationship is created, the field Update liveCache is automatically filled with the value 10 – At time of release creation .

  • Scheduling agreement with forecast

    You use this indicator to specify whether forecast/planning delivery schedules are to be generated in addition to operative schedules. In the standard system, this indicator is not preset when an external procurement relationship is created.

    If you want to work principally with forecast/planning delivery schedules, you can specify that the indicator is automatically preset when an external procurement relationship is created using the Business Add-In (BAdI) /SAPAPO/PWB_TPSRC_IN . Using this BAdI you can also influence other data relating to the external procurement relationship or the transportation lane.

    Note Note

    You can also specify in the release creation profile whether forecast/planning delivery schedules are to be generated in addition to operative schedules. For this reason, the settings in the release creation profile and the Scheduling Agreement with Forecast field must be harmonized.

    End of the note.

  • Internet release

    This indicator enables you to specify whether or not the scheduling agreement release is an Internet Releaseand whether it has to be acknowledged by the vendor.

  • Address data

    Address data is not transferred from the ERP system. If you do not maintain any address data on the Partners tab page, the address data of the source location is used.

    Use the relevant symbol to maintain your own address data for an external procurement relationship.

You can only influence other data by changing it in the ERP system (for example, a change to the scheduling agreement).

Deactivate External Procurement Relationship

If a purchasing info record, a contract, or a scheduling agreement is deleted in your ERP system, the relevant external procurement relationship is deactivated in the SCM system.

This procurement alternative can no longer be used in the source determination process. The log for the source determination process draws your attention to the fact that the relevant procurement alternative has been deactivated.

Furthermore, no new transportation lanes can be created for deactivated external procurement relationships.

Delete External Procurement Relationship

If you no longer need an external procurement relationship in the SCM system, you can delete it. In order for you to be able to do this, the external procurement relationship must have been deactivated. Furthermore, no external procurement orders or quota arrangements may exist in the SCM system for this external procurement relationship.

You can delete external procurement relationships as follows:

  • In the external procurement relationship

    Display the relevant external procurement relationship ( Start of the navigation path Master Data Next navigation step Procurement Master Data Next navigation step Procurement Relationships End of the navigation path ) and choose Delete .

  • Using the report Delete Procurement Relationships

    Choose Start of the navigation path Master Data Next navigation step Procurement Master Data Next navigation step Delete Procurement Relationships End of the navigation path and select the external procurement relationships that you want to delete. Choose Delete . All external procurement relationships marked accordingly with the green symbol are deleted.

Mass Maintenance

You can use mass maintenance to change data that can also be changed in master data maintenance.

For further information see Mass Maintenance of External Procurement Relationships .