As a sales engineer, you need to sell and distribute finished products to the company’s business partners. You need to handle various sales documents, such as inquiry, quotation, sales order, and billing documents. The accounting process for these documents is determined using account assignment.
Assigning Accounts for Sales Documents
Objectives
After completing this lesson, you will be able to:
- Create sales documents
- Assign sales documents
Business Example
Structure of a Sales Document
Account Assignment Category in Project Accounting
The account assignment category is important in project accounting because it does the following:
Determines if the sales order is assigned to a project
Determines if the sales order item is a controlling object
Defines if inventory quantities for the sales order requirement are treated as collective or special stock by inventory management
If the project is the controlling object, revenues billed on the sales order item are transferred to the project. Results analysis is then performed on the project, and the revenue and related cost of sales are settled to profitability analysis for ongoing profitability measurement.
If the sales order item is defined as a controlling object, the costs of the project can be settled to the sales order item. Results analysis is performed at the sales order level, and the revenue and related cost of sales are settled to profitability analysis for ongoing profitability measurement.
Sales Document Structure
The sales document type describes the type of business transaction and determines functions and document flows within sales order processing.
All sales documents have the same basic structure, with a document header and multiple document items. The document header contains data that applies to all items. Data that only applies to some items is created at item level.
An item consists of one or more schedule lines that contain all of the data required for delivery. For example, if a customer places an order for 20 units of a product, you enter this as an item in the order. You can supply only 10 units now, but more units will be ready next month, so you need to schedule two deliveries. The data for these deliveries (dates and confirmed quantities) is stored in two schedule lines.
You assign item categories to sales document types. The system defaults an item category when you create an order and stipulates the item categories that users can choose it they do not want to accept the default category.
You assign schedule line categories to item categories. The system defaults a schedule line category when you enter a document and stipulates the schedule line categories that users can choose if they do not want to accept the default category.
Functions in Sales Orders
You sell and ship products or provide services for business partners in SD. Data for products, services, and business partners is the basis of Sales and Distribution (SD) processing. SD includes inquiry, quotation, and sales order processing, as well as shipping and billing. Each of these areas has sales documents that contain specific data for their respective activities.
When you create a sales order, the system automatically defaults data from the appropriate master records. The system takes the sales, delivery, pricing, and billing data from the customer master record and copies customer-specific master data about texts, partners, and contacts. For each material in the order, the system defaults data about pricing, delivery, schedule, weight, and volume specifications.
The sales order includes the following functions:
Requirements transfer:
Independent requirement
Assembly (PP, SM, PS)
Availability check:
Available to promise (ATP)
Pricing:
Cost of goods manufactured from network costing as condition
Account assignment:
Sales order item as own CO object
Account assignment to project
Billing:
Generates down payment request or invoice
Revenues in project
Scheduling:
Network scheduling determines confirmed delivery date
Item Categories
You assign each sales order item an item category.
The sales document type and material item category group determine the item category assigned in the sales document.
The item category provides control functions for sales order documents, such as the billing method (using a billing plan, resource-related billing, or delivery-related billing). In case of a billing plan, a billing plan type has to be assigned to the item category.
The billing plan type, in return, contains several assigned date categories.
At billing date level, the date category controls:
Whether the billing date is a fixed date
Whether the billing date contains a billing block as well as the type of the billing block
With which billing type the billing date is to be billed
The billing rule that specifies how the value to be billed for a date is to be determined
Using milestone billing, it is possible to assign milestones to the dates of a billing plan, for example, out of a project network.
If you are using milestone billing in your project, you have to assign a usage to the milestone. The usage defines the billing plan type and the date categories, which are necessary for the system to determine the difference between an item for a down payment request and an item for partial billing.
The system can process a material in each document type using an item category. If you choose an alternative search strategy for the requirements type determination, the item category becomes an influencing factor in the selection process.
Item Category Determination
You can assign the item category group to the material master in the Sales: Sales Org 2 view of the material master record.
In Customizing, the item category is assigned to the combination of item category, group, and sales document type. This combination determines if an item is relevant for delivery or billing, among other characteristics.
The system defaults the item category when you create an order. You can accept the default category or overwrite it. You can define permitted item categories in Customizing.
The item category group for P-FLP00 is ZPS3. Order type IN derives item category AFX. Order type ZPS1 derives item category ZTP1.
Assembly Processing with Projects
If you create a sales order for a material that has a requirements class assigned to it for assembly processing, the system automatically creates an assembly order in the background and begins assembly processing. This action circumvents MRP and creates an operational order directly from the sales order.
Assembly Orders
You can create several assembly orders.
Network
Production order
Planned order
Plant maintenance or service order
Process order
In assembly processing, you can use all of the functions of both sales orders and assembly orders. The direct connection between sales orders and assembly orders indicates that changes made in one document are automatically reflected in the other. The assembly process offers the following advantages:
Overall network scheduling is used to determine confirmed delivery dates in sales order items.
Network costing can be used as a condition type in the condition schema.
Billing milestones of the network are automatically copied to the dates of the billing plan.
The assembly controls of an assembly order are created for the SD document in the requirements class table. The order type determines the category of assembly order (PP, PM, SM, and so on) and its control functions.
Requirements Type and Requirements Class
The account assignment category is determined from the requirements class associated with the requirements type assigned to the sales order item.
Default Strategy to Determine the Requirements Type
Requirements type determination defines the source of the requirements type. In the standard system, requirements types are determined according to a specific search strategy beginning with the material strategy group.
The system makes an attempt to find a requirements type using the strategy group in the material master. The strategy group determines the main planning strategy, which in turn identifies the customer requirements and becomes the requirements type for the sales order item.
If the strategy group is not maintained, the system determines it using the MRP group defined in the material master.
If you have not defined the MRP group in the material master, the system assumes a special rule and attempts to find a requirements type based on the item category and MRP type.
If this action is not possible, the system makes a final attempt to find a requirements type with only the item category.
If this attempt fails, the system declares the transaction as not relevant for the availability check or transfer of requirements.
You can override the default strategy in the Customizing step Check Control of Requirements Type Determination. If the Source field contains value 1 or 2, the requirements type is selected from the item category derived from the sales document type and material item category group.
Requirements Class
The account assignment category is determined from the requirements class associated with the requirements type assigned to the sales order item.
The requirements class also controls whether assembly processing is performed for the sales order item. Assembly processing enables sales order item creation or a change process to automatically create or change the production orders, planned orders, or networks required.
The assembly type determines the type of orders that the system can create during assembly processing. This field must always have the value production order, network, or service (static 2) for use with networks. It is the only selection that supports automatic network creation.
An entry for an order type is also required with assembly processing. The order type defines the network creation rules that need to be used during automatic generation.
The valuation setting determines if the special stock is valuated or non-valuated. When a WBS is present, the use of project stock and how it is valuated is defined by the project definition.
Categories of Account Assignment
The account assignment category determines the controlling object to which document quantities and values are assigned.
Use the account assignment category for the following:
Using the Consumption posting indicator, you can determine the controlling object for the sales item. E determines that the sales order is a cost object, and P determines that the project is the controlling object. If P is determined, the sales order item is assigned to a WBS.
The Special stock indicator determines the type of stock required for delivery. This action is important if sales order items are relevant for delivery through SD. The account assignment category from the sales order item does not influence the account assignment category assigned to the component materials listed in the network.
Account Assignment Categories
Account assignment categories include the following: E (Customer Indiv. Req.), D (Indiv. Cuts/Settle Proj.), Q (Project Make-to-Order), G (MTS Product/Project), and F (Order).
Special stock indicators include the following: E (Order on Hand) and Q (Project Stock).
Consumption posting indicators include the following: E (Accounting via Sales Order), P (Accounting via Project), and V (Consumption).
The combinations of these account assignment categories, special stock, and consumption posting indicators are displayed in the Account Assignment Categories figure.
SD: Account Assignment and Processes
The accounting process for the sales order item is determined by the account assignment category assigned to the sales item.
Some possibilities for WBS and networks are shown in the SD: Account Assignment and Processes figure:
The figure represents a make-to-order production process (assembly processing) without a WBS. In this case, the sales order item is the controlling instrument. Account assignment category E specifies that the sales order item forms a separate CO object. The network is assigned to the sales order item. Costs and revenues of the sales order item are usually settled to the profitability segment.
Using assembly processing, you can also generate a network and WBS. When you save your data, the system creates a WBS and assigns the sales order item to a WBS element in this WBS. The sales view is depicted by the sales order. The controlling instrument is the project. Logistical processing is represented by the network. Account assignment categories D or Q (Cons. = P in each case) specify that revenues are assigned to the billing WBS element of the project.
As an alternative to assembly processing, you can manually assign a sales order item to a WBS element in a project. Controlling takes place in the project. You can assign orders or documents to the project. Value assignment to the project is controlled through account assignment categories G, D, and Q, which differ in the way they manage quantities.
Account assignment category D requires the use of non-valuated sales order stock.