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 Specifications in the Classification System

Purpose

This process describes how you create specifications for a material and its batches.

Process Flow

  1. You define properties of the material and its batches and store them as characteristics in the classification system.

  2. You can define all those properties that you consider important and useful for batch determination as characteristics.

    If you create a numerical characteristic, you must enter a unit of measurement. If you do not enter the unit of measurement, you cannot link the characteristics to the master characteristics of the Quality Management component.

  3. You create classes for the material and the batches and assign the characteristics to the classes.

You can use the same class for different materials.

Class type

You must assign the class to a class type. There are two class types of the category Batch for batches and their materials:

  • 022 at plant level

  • 023 at client or material level

  1. You create the material master record, assign the desired class to the material and assign characteristics to the material.

  • You can store tolerance ranges for the batches of the material in the material master record. This is possible as the material and the batches are in the same class.

  • You can assign only one class of the class type "batch" (022, 023) to each material. This means that multiple classification is not possible.

  • You can only create batches for a material if the material is to be handled in batches. To do this, you must set the Batch management indicator in the material master record. Depending on the material type, you will find this indicator in either the Purchasing view, the Work Scheduling view, or the Storage view.

  • The replenishment lead time should not be considered in the dynamic availability check for batches, since batches are not reproducible. In the General Sales view, or in the MRP view, choose availability check group CH . Group CH takes the identical inward and outward movements as group 01 into account, but does not consider the replenishment lead time. For further information, see section Types of Availability Check in Sales and Distribution Processing in the SD - Sales and Distribution Processing documentation.

  1. Depending on the system settings, you create the batch master record manually, or you let the system carry this out automatically.

Assigning Actual Values to a Batch

Actual values can be assigned to batches in the following ways:

  • The system automatically transfers the inspection results from Quality Management (QM) if the master inspection characteristics are linked to the general characteristics. See section General Characteristic in the QM – Basic Data documentation.

  • You can use a customer exit in the background to assign values to characteristics that are not from QM (time of goods receipt, for example). All required goods movement data is available in the customer exit interface. The data is controlled according to the movement type. You make the necessary settings in Customizing for Batch Management , under Start of the navigation path Batch valuation Next navigation step Customer Exit for classification of user-defined characstic End of the navigation path .

  • You enter the actual value manually.

Note Note

For each movement type you can configure the system so that it branches automatically, or only on request to the classification system. See Customizing for Batch Management under Define batch creation for goods movements.

The characteristic values are contained under the Characteristics node ( Start of the navigation path Logistics Next navigation step Central Next navigation step Functions Next navigation step Classification Next navigation step Master Data Next navigation step Characteristics End of the navigation path ). The material master record ( Start of the navigation path Logistics Next navigation step Materials Management Next navigation step Material Master Next navigation step Material Next navigation step Display End of the navigation path ) contains the values that you have assigned to the material. To display the characteristic value assignment for a batch, go to the batch master record ( Start of the navigation path Logistics Next navigation step Central Functions Next navigation step Batch Management Next navigation step Batch Next navigation step Display End of the navigation path ) or the object list ( Start of the navigation path Logistics Next navigation step Central Next navigation step Functions Next navigation step Classification Next navigation step Environment Next navigation step Reporting Next navigation step Object List End of the navigation path ).

End of the note.

Result

  • The system recognizes that the material is to be handled in batches.

  • You must enter a batch number for each goods movement of this material.

  • You can create batch master records. See also Creating a Batch Master Record .

Note Note

You can also use batch management for materials that are assigned a serial number profile.

End of the note.