Integrating Product Master with Product Compliance

In this lesson, you’ll learn about integrating the product master with product compliance.

The integration of the product master with product compliance is crucial to safeguard compliance in the value chain.

The compliance view is the single source of truth regarding product compliance information, so integration with the product master is the key to processing compliance information in the value chain.

Identifying a product relevant to compliance is the initial and only step in the product master. With this indication, further information can be derived from details of the product master:

• Assigned plants with procurement type indicate production countries/regions.
• Distribution chains indicate the countries/regions where the product is intended to be sold.

Any time a product is set to compliance relevant for the first time or as a change, a request from logistics is created to inform the product stewardship specialist of the case.

Finally, the Compliance Information for Products app allows users to retrieve compliance information for relevant products. Users can also request additional market assessments for new countries/regions, for production, or for selling the product.

Whenever the Master Data Specialist - Product Master sets Compliance Relevant to Yes in the product master, a request from logistics is created automatically, and the Product Stewardship Specialist - Product Compliance receives a launchpad notification to make them aware of the new product.

This informs the Product Stewardship Specialist - Product Compliance to take care of the new, compliance-relevant product.

There are some more details from the product master, which are essential for product compliance:

• Distribution Chains.
• Plants assigned to the product with a procurement type indicating in-house production.

Whenever the Master Data Specialist - Product Master changes more details from the product master, which are essential for product compliance:

• Adds a new Distribution Chain.
• Assigns a new Plant to the product with a procurement type indicating in-house production.

A request from logistics is created automatically, and the Product Stewardship Specialist - Product Compliance receives a launchpad notification to inform the user of relevant changes on a compliance-relevant product.

With the assignment of the logistics role, Transported, and the assignment of a compliance purpose comprising dangerous goods compliance requirements, dangerous goods classification processing is initiated.

This applies to unpackaged products and raw materials according to business needs.

Be aware that you need to assign packaged products from the product master to the respective compliance views to complete the dangerous goods classification of the packaged product.

For a new (or newly compliance-relevant) product, the following information is derived from product master details and taken over to the request from logistics:

Prio 1: from Distribution Chains - for product compliance, this means:

• Business Process: "Sell In".
• With countries/regions to be verified, which are derived from sales organizations of distribution chains.

Prio 2: if no distribution chains exist, from plants-for product compliance, this means:

• Business process: "Produce In".
• With countries/regions derived from plants with procurement types "In-house Production", or "Both Procurement Types".

For processing of such requests from logistics, the following applies:

• If a new compliance view is created and assigned to the new product master, business processes and countries/regions are transferred from the logistics request to the new compliance view.
• If the new product master is assigned to an existing compliance view, the Product Stewardship Specialist must manually adapt business processes and countries/regions.

The assignment of a distribution chain for product compliance indicates the business process "Sell in."

The countries/regions related to distribution chains must be verified regarding product compliance aspects for the business process Sell In.

In case the Product Stewardship Specialist creates a new compliance view based on the request from logistics:

• The logistics role "Sold" is proposed for assignment to the compliance view. Because the logistics role "Sold" implies mandatory assignment of the role "Transported", this one is also proposed.
• Countries/regions related to distribution chains must be verified regarding product compliance aspects for the business process, ''Sell In''.

The assignment of a plant for product compliance gives an indication of the business process "Produce in."

Details can be derived from the Procurement Type for the plant:

• In-house production (E) - the product is produced at this plant.
• Both procurement types (X), meaning in-house production and external procurement - the product is supposed to be produced at this plant, but could also be sourced externally.

The country/region related to the plant must be verified regarding product compliance aspects for the Produce In business process.

In case the Product Stewardship Specialist creates a new compliance view based on the request from logistics:

• The logistics role "Produced" is proposed for assignment to the compliance view.
• Countries/regions of assigned plants with mentioned procurement types are automatically assigned to the compliance view for verification for the business process Produce In.

In case an existing product master is newly set to compliance relevant = Yes, automated creation of a request from logistics occurs, similar to a new product master, being compliance-relevant right from the beginning.

A request from logistics is not only created when the Compliance Relevant field is set to Yes, but also for a compliance-relevant product in the following situations:

The first situation is when the distribution chain is added.

The second situation is when a plant view is added to an unpackaged product.

The third situation is when a procurement type in a plant view is changed.

For an existing and already compliance-relevant product master, the following changes initiate automated creation of a request from logistics:

• Adding a new distribution chain;
• Adding a new plant with procurement types:
  • In-house production;
  • Both procurement types (in-house production and external procurement).
• Changing the procurement type of an existing plant to in-house production or both procurement types.

When processing these requests, the product stewardship specialist must manually process any adaptation of an existing compliance view, such as the assignment of compliance purposes, to initiate required compliance assessments.