Planning 
During internal order planning, you enter costs, activities and business processes that you expect to incur during the life cycle of an order. Using internal order planning, you can compare plan and actual costs, and carry out a differentiated variance analysis.
You can plan individual internal orders and groups of orders with the same order type (see also: Order Groups).
Note
Unlike cost center planning, you can plan overhead rates on internal orders (except for statistical orders) as well as overheads.
Implementation Considerations
Cost planning is performed mostly on internal orders with long durations. You do not usually plan internal orders that only exist for a very short period (such as, internal orders for unexpected small repairs). You can plan order costs in more than one version and using various planning forms, depending on when you are planning and the information available.
Integration
You can manage the approved cost framework for an internal order or an order group using Budget Management.
Features
The SAP system provides you with a range of planning functions for the processing of internal orders covering the different levels of planning detail required at different stages of order execution:
Integrated Planning
Integrated Planning for Internal Orders allows you to settle internal order plan data to cost centers or business processes. You can then transfer them to Profit Center Accounting and the General Ledger. To do this, you should note the difference between:
Plan-Integrated Internal Orders
Plan-integrated internal orders enable you to plan cost elements and activity inputs integrated with cost centers and business processes in a plan version. The system updates plan allocations directly to the cost center or the business process. You can settle plan integrated internal orders to cost centers and business processes in the plan. You then transfer the plan data to Profit Center Accounting and the Extended General Ledger.
Non-Plan-Integrated Internal Orders
You can only plan costs and activities locally on non-plan-integrated internal orders. There is no scheduling on the performing cost centers or business processes. You cannot execute a plan settlement of these orders to cost centers and business processes. Neither can you transfer the data to Profit Center Accounting or the General Ledger.
Planning in More Than One Plan Version
Information on an internal order changes constantly during the planning phase. This means it may be necessary to plan an internal order in more than one version. This corresponds to the planning process in normal business practice. You can plan internal orders in as many versions as you wish.
These individual plan versions can be:
Stored separately in the system
Changed
Copying (see also: Copy Versions)
Compared using the reports available in the information system (for example, plan/plan comparisons, comparisons between actual costs and the various plan versions). So for example, you can use this to compare best and worst-case planning scenarios.
Types of Planning
Manual Internal Order Planning
Activity-dependent or activity independent planning of both primary and secondary costs, which occur as a result of activity input.
Automatic internal order planning of the allocations made at period-end closing.
Planning of allocations that occur during period-end closing from cost centers to orders.
Period-End Closing
In period-end closing, you can debit an order in version 0 using overhead, assessments or distribution. You can also execute a periodic reposting of plan-integrated internal orders. You do this by debiting or settling indirect activity allocation.
Planning Documentation
You can record changes to internal order planning in planning documents. You normally do so for changes in a plan that has already been approved. You use the Write plan line items activity, which you allow by setting an appropriate user status (see also: Status Management for Internal Orders) to define whether and from which status planning documents are written.