Setting Up System Default Values

Objective

After completing this lesson, you will be able to set up system default values for employee information records

Default Values

Instead of entering the master data manually, for some fields you can define default values for it. The system proposes these values when infotypes that affect employee master data are maintained.

The system often uses features based on the fields of the Organizational Assignment infotype, such as personnel area, personnel subarea, employee group, and employee subgroup to determine default values. The value proposed in a particular field, (the return value), is based on the configuration of the feature. As a result, the system proposes these default values when you maintain infotypes that affect employee master data.

For example, the ABKRS feature determines default values for the payroll area using employee data from the Organizational Assignment infotype. Another example is the LGMST feature, which proposes the wage types permitted for an employee in the Basic Pay infotype.

Default Values: Features

Features are objects in the SAP system that query different personnel or data structure fields to determine a specific value. The system uses this value to define defaults and to control certain system processes. In this way, features improve system flexibility.

Based on the company-specific requirements for default values, a change made to a feature is termed as feature maintenance.

You can call feature maintenance in the following ways:

Call the feature maintenance transaction:
You can call the feature maintenance transaction, PE03, directly. The Features: Initial Screen appears.
Modifying the existing tree structure of the feature:
You can introduce your own decision criteria by modifying the existing tree structure of the feature and giving default values based on company-specific requirements. As shown in the figure, for country USA , employee group, active , the payroll area is 02 . This means that all active employees will be processed together for payroll in the payroll area 02 .

The feature is maintained as a decision tree for determining default values. Decision trees can be simple or complex depending on their function and the number of fields, operations, and decision criteria they contain. After the maintenance, the features need to be activated to become effective.

Note

Report RPUMKG00 activates features.

Maintaining Features

On the Features: Initial Screen , the following sub-objects appear:

Decision tree:
Decision tree queries data structures to determine return values. You can maintain decision trees using table or tree maintenance.
Attributes:
Attributes includes administration related data of a feature including the structure (fields that can be queries in the decision tree) and country assignment.
Documentation:
Documentation includes information on the structure and the functions.

The figure above shows how the decision tree of the feature ABKRS queries personnel or data structure fields to determine a specific value or return a specific code. If an employee from Germany belongs to the employee group Active and Employee Subgroup D1 , then the system would automatically default the value 20 in the Organizational Assignment infotype (0001).

Applications of Features

Although you can use features for different purposes, their most important applications are:

Features That Define Default Values:
The system often uses features to determine default values. When you maintain infotypes that affect employee master data, the system suggests these default values. The feature either delivers a default value directly that is then written to the relevant infotype field or the feature delivers a key entry as a return code that the system can use to read one or more tables.The system takes the stored default values from these tables and enters them in the relevant infotype. for example, Feature LGMST -> Basic Pay(infotype 0008).

Hint

The system always reads these default values when you create an infotype.
Features That Control System Processes:
Pnnnn features (nnnn stands for the infotype number) control the sequence in which the system displays country-specific screens when you maintain or display master data infotypes.
Features That Automatically Generate Mail Messages:
Some features automatically generate mail messages when you change certain master data fields, such as the various administrators in the Organizational Assignment ( 0001 ) infotype.

For example, feature M0001 is used in Personal Administration and Recruitment to control the recipient of an e-mail, the conditions under which the e-mail is sent, and the content of the e-mail.

Learning

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