Message control settings for customer master

It is often requested by most of the businesses to have a control in customer master data creation, such as to avoid duplicate customer numbers with same address data, same VAT, number, etc. Standard SAP provides this facility via a message control settings in the customer master. You can configure standard SAP messages based on your business requirement to avoid such cases.

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Author: Anupa Wijesinghe

  Message Control Settings for Customer Master by Anupa Wijesinghe on Scribd

Outbound Scheduling with customer calendar

Sometime back we discussed about the Transportation scheduling in SAP. Please click here to read it. Today I will explain the system behavior of assigning a unloading point calendar to the ship to party with the transportation scheduling activated.

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Author: Anupa Wijesinghe

  Outbound Scheduling With Customer Calendar by Anupa Wijesinghe on Scribd

How to avoid credit released documents go through credit check again

Let's say you have a sales document for a specific customer which was credit blocked. Therefore "Credit Status" in the sales order header / Status tab was set to "Not approved".

Credit department has released the credit block via transaction VKM4. Once sales document is released, you can see the "Credit Status" in the sales order header is set to "Released".

There can be subsequent changes in the same sales document (After credit release), which are not relevant for credit check. For example, you can add sales text to order header, etc. But such changes should not carry out a new credit check and block the sales order again.

This can be achieved using standard SAP setting in the automatic credit control settings. 

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Author: Anupa Wijesinghe

How to Avoid Credit Released Documents Go Through Credit Check Again by Anupa Wijesinghe on Scribd

Free Goods Determination in SAP

Free goods is a standard SAP delivered functionality that can be implemented to handle promotions such as “Buy 2 get 1 Free”. In this case, you have 2 scenarios to look at.

1 – Buy 2 get 1 free – In this case customer is only paying for 1 item and physically getting 2. This scenario is known as “Inclusive”

2 – Buy 2 and get 3rd item free – In this case, customer only pays for 2 items and he get’s another item for free. This scenario is known as “Exclusive”

Let’s see how we can configure the inclusive free goods scenario in SAP. Fee goods use the famous condition technique in SAP. Please click here to read about the condition technique in SAP.

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Author: Anupa Wijesinghe

Free Goods Determination in SAP by Anupa Wijesinghe on Scribd

The Mysterious Next Date in Credit Management

When analyzing the credit history of a customer it is key that we are aware of the terminology and fields used for this purpose in SAP.

In this document I am going to discuss the meaning of “Next Date” field that is on the Sales order and comes up on credit reports. Many instances, there seem to be confusion as to how this field gets updated and how to use the information!

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Author: Gayani Karunathilake

The Mysterious Next Date in Credit Management by Gayani Karunathilake on Scribd

Process Inbound IDOCs From PI using serialization

Sometime back we discussed about how we can process IDOCs using serialization in SAP. Click here to read it. 
There are business requirements where you need to process multiple IDOC message types in a serialized manner using PI immediately without a scheduled batch job. i.e. Customer master with address master (DEBMAS with ADRMAS) Vendor master with address master (CREMAS with ADRMAS) Info record master with vendor master & material master (INFREC with MATMAS and CREMAS) In order to process these IDOC’s successfully, you must process then in a sequence. It is not necessary IDOCs to be for master data distribution, you can serialize any message type. 

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Author: Harsha Thelikorala

Process Inbound IDOCs From PI Using Serialization

Process Inbound IDOCs Using Serialization

When there is a dependency between IDOC message types while processing or distributing, IDOCs must be processed in a serialized manner. 

In order to achieve this requirement, IDOC serialization must be used.

i.e. Vendor Master, Customer Master, Material Master, etc.

If you want to read about how we can process Inbound IDOCs from PI Using Serialization; please click here.

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Author: Harsha Thelikorala

  Process Inbound IDOCs Using Serialization by Harsha Thelikorala

How to activate AFS top node check (JS Partner) by sales organization

Earlier we discussed about the error message that we have seen in IS-AFS system at sales order creation. i.e; Top node XXXX for ship-to YYYY not maintained or ship-to is not valid

Message no. 8W321

Click here to read more about the JS partner function in IS-AFS.

This is a global setting in the AFS system and therefore you cannot activate/ de-activate it only for a given company code or for a sales organization.

But in todays business world it is very common that one company acquire another company. Lets say both companies were on SAP IS-AFS and one has the top node heck activated and other doesn’t. Now when you try to migrate customer master date from top node de-activated SAP system to the tope node active SAP system, you will get above mentioned error message. 

In such a scenario you have 2 options to manage this situation.

1. Do the necessary master data change in the partner functions to have “JS” partner assigned to all ship to parties

2. Control the top node check error message for a given sales org / company

Today we will discuss about the 2nd option mentioned above.

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Author: Anupa Wijesinghe

  How to Activate AFS Top Node Check (JS) by Sales Organization

Customer Master Field Settings per Company Code

Sometime back we discussed how we could set customer master fields visible, hidden or mandatory using customizing of account groups. Click here to view the documentation. Those customizing settings at the account group level will applicable for all company codes that you operate in your SAP system. Today we are going to discuss about a business requirement where you have to share the same account group for customer master creation, but want to have different field settings based on the company code.

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Author: Anupa Wijesinghe

  Customer Master Field Settings Per Company Code

Customer Classification

SAP has provided standard set of fields in the customer master to be used for various purposes. Some fields are per-defined for certain purposes with an attached functionality behind. In order to provide maximum flexibility for SAP users, there are some fields which are not pre-defined, but can be used for custom purposes such as; Customer Group 1 to 5. But those fields are depending on the sales area of the customer. If you want to define a value which is independent of the sales area, you can define your own classification for customers. This classification can be attached to customer master with different characteristic values. Since this is not sales area depended, you can define it as a global value for the customer master.

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   Customer Classification

One time customer master in SAP

A customer who only comes into a business transaction with you once is called one-time customers in SAP terminology.
Since they come only once, it is not necessary to create a master record (Customer Master) in SAP for such a customer. To reduce the database space, you can create a customer master record within the business transaction to store that data.
In order to create such a customer, you can have a template customer in SAP to determine all default values required in the customer master. This will ensure less data entry and accuracy at the real customer creation.

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   One Time Customer Master in SAP

Mass document change in SAP (IS-AFS)

Same like mass change transaction "MASS" in SAP standard (R/3), there are additional mass change transactions specifically for IS-AFS (Industry Solution - Apparel and Footwear). (Click here to see more detail about standard "MASS" transaction). 

These IS-AFS specific mass change transactions are;

• /AFS/MDC - Mass Document Change
• /AFS/MCC - Mass Customer Change

The main reason to introduce such AFS specific transactions is; because in IS-AFS we have AFS specific data in sales documents, such as sizes, AFS customer groups, etc. Therefore some time it is required to change certain size level data as a mass change. This is not supported in "MASS" transaction.

Let's see how we can use mass document change transaction to change AFS sales documents.

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   Mass Document Change in SAP (is-AFS)

Customer Master Field Settings - Account Groups

Some time back we discussed about how you can set material master fields visible, hidden or mandatory (Click here to view that). In the same manner you can control fields appear in the customer master as well. This is done at the "Account Group" level of the customer master. Therefore the setting that you do under a specific account group apply to all customers you create with that account group. In addition to that, you can control field settings based on the transaction (Create / Change / Display) as well.

Let's see how you can configure above using standard SAP customizing. 

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   Customer Master Field Settings - Account Groups by   Anupa Wijesinghe

How to create and activate International address versions

"International address version" allows you to maintain multiple versions of the same address for a given customer/vendor in SAP. This functionality is very commonly used for customers who need to have multiple versions of the same address in different languages. For example, let's say a business which uses SAP in USA has a customer in Japan. The address printed in all sales/shipping documents used within USA for that customer should be printed in the language English, where as in all documents sent to the customer, the address should be printed in Japanese. Therefore it is necessary to maintain same address in two versions within SAP. You can code the print program to pick the correct address version (language) during document printing.

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How to Create and Activate International Address Versions