Authorized Partners
You can authorize several sold-to parties to release products against a contract. This means that not only the original sold-to party can release the products and services according to the conditions agreed upon in the contract. Other related sold-to parties also have this authorization.
Authorized partners are determined as follows:
You can create a list of individual authorized sold-to parties in the contract. When you create a sales order for one of these sold-to parties, the system determines the relevant contracts.
You enter one or more group hierarchies in the contract. When you create a sales order for one of the business partners in the hierarchy, the system determines the relevant contracts.
You enter a business partner who is contained in a group hierarchy. The system automatically finds the hierarchy and authorizes all other business partners below this business partner in the hierarchy to place contract release orders. Note that you cannot enter a hierarchy node manually.
You can also use a combination of the options mentioned above.
Integration
The Authorized Partners
function is integrated in sales contracts. It is based on the Authorized Sold-to Party
partner function and uses partner determination to calculate which sold-to parties are relevant.
Prerequisites
If you want to use group hierarchies other than pricing hierarchies to determine authorized partners, you must create a custom hierarchy category and a hierarchy:
To create a hierarchy category, go to Customizing for CRM and choose
Master Data
Business Partner
Account Hierarchy
.You must have activated the necessary settings for the sales contract and the contract release order in Customizing for SAP CRM. For more information, see Customizing under
Transactions
Settings for Contracts
Define Settings for Authorized Partners
.
Activities
When you create a contract, you enter any additional authorized sold-to parties in the Authorized Partners
assignment block.
When you create a sales order to release products against a contract, the system checks whether a contract exists for the combination of product and partner that you have entered in the order. When the system checks the partners, it determines which sold-to party is involved (according to the settings you made in Customizing). The following options are possible:
Main sold-to party
Authorized sold-to party
Business partner in a group hierarchy that has been entered as authorized
Example
The main sales office of company ABC Inc. closes a contract with their supplier that is valid for all the company's branches across the country. Each of these branches is also a sold-to party and is authorized to release products against the contract. When a business partner from branch B2 creates a sales order to release products against a contract, the system checks whether this sold-to party is an authorized partner for the contract.