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Procedure documentationChanging a Material

 

You can use the Change Material service to create a change request for changing a single material. This change request goes through the predetermined workflow process and when complete results in the change of the selected material in the active area. Creating the change request copies the material to the staging area. A material can only be assigned to one active change request at a time, so no new change requests can be created for a material that is already in the staging area. Parallel processing of change requests enables multiple change requests for a single material. See Parallel Change Requests for more detail on parallel processing.

Caution Caution

Avoid using the back-end system to change material master fields under governance. If you make changes to these fields while the material is part of the change request process, all your changes to fields under governance are overwritten when the change request is approved and not just those fields affected by the change request.

You will however receive a warning during validation that this data has changed and you then have the option of viewing the changes made in the back-end system and incorporating them into your change request. You can then submit the change request for validation again.

You can adjust the default behavior with SAP Note 1797009Information published on SAP site. Implementing this note means that the system only overwrites changes to entities present in the change request rather than all entities.

End of the caution.

Prerequisites

The material to be changed must exist in the active area and must not be locked by another change request. In the case of parallel change requests the relevant entities must not be locked by another change request. You must have maintained a change request type for material change and have set up your workflow for this change request type.

Procedure

  1. Open the Change Material Service

    In the Material Governance work center, select the Change Material service.

  2. Select a material

    Enter a material ID in the Material field or use the input help to choose one. In the Change Request Type field enter the change request type for editing a material. Click the Continue button to proceed.

    You can also use the template feature to add a new plant assignment or distribution chain to the material at this point. You cannot overwrite existing plant assignment or distribution chain data in this way.

  3. Change to edit mode

    To change the material to edit mode, choose the Edit button.

  4. Enter change request details

    In the Change Request section, enter a description for your change request in the Description field. You can enter details for your change request such as priority, due date, and reason. You can also add comments and attach relevant files.

  5. Enter changes and submit

    Enter the changes you want to make to the material and click the Submit button to submit your change request.

Result

Your new change request is created and sent for processing according to the rule-based workflow you have assigned to the change material process. Normally this means that it passes to a Master Data Steward who reviews the changes. Once the change request has been approved and technical validation has taken place the changed material data replaces the existing data in the active area. The material is no longer available in the staging area and can be included in new change requests. In the case of parallel change requests the relevant entities are no longer available in the staging area and can be included in new parallel change requests.