Setting up Master Inspection Characteristics

Often, the same characteristic, for example packing material, length or surface quality must be inspected for several materials. The Quality Planner can define these characteristics as master inspection characteristics and reuses them when creating an inspection plan.

Play the video to learn how master inspection characteristics can simplify the master data maintenance.

As Marco and Petra outline in the video, an inspection characteristic describes the inspection criteria and represents what is to be inspected. The following list summarizes some relevant control indicators and the questions that they answer.

• Characteristic type: Is it a qualitative or quantitative characteristic?
• Results confirmation type: How must the Quality Technician record the results?

  Examples:

  • Summarized: Only record the average result when inspecting multiple samples
  • Single results: Record results for each inspected sample. The system calculates the average value and, if applicable, the number of samples above/below the thresholds.
  • Classed recording: Record how many samples lie within each value bin
• Characteristic processing type: Is it a required or an optional characteristic?
• Quantitative limit: Does a quantitative characteristic have an upper/lower limit or a combination of both?
• List of values: Does a qualitative characteristic have a list of values or should the Quality Technician only record "accepted" or "rejected"?
• Sampling procedure: Does the characteristic require a sampling procedure to be assigned when it is used in a plan?
• Defect records: If rejected, does the system automatically create defect records?
• And so on.

The Quality Planner defines these properties in control indicators. The following figure illustrates two system screen shots displaying the control indicators.

The screenshots provide an example of a qualitative master inspection characteristic in the Quality Planner. Due to the large number of possible settings, the control key is maintained on two consecutive screens.

• The characteristic doesn't have attributes (→ Charc. Attribute, screen 1). Therefore, the Quality Technician only records whether the characteristic is accepted or rejected during result recording.
• Since there is no Sampling Procedure assigned (screen 1), the system uses the default sampling procedure for this plant defined by the Consultant in customizing.
• When performing the inspection, the Quality Technician records the results in summarized form (→ Summ. Recording, screen 1), there is only one result for all inspected samples. They must adhere to the inspection scope determined when the system calculates the sample size: → Fixed Scope (screen 2).
• The characteristic is mandatory (→ Reqired Charc., screen 1). If the Quality Technician cannot or does not want to record results, the Quality Engineer must force the usage decision.
• The Quality Technician does not need to provide additional information in free-text format irrespective whether the characteristic is accepted or rejected (→ No documentation, screen 2).

To define inspection scenarios that are often used in your company, the Application Consultant creates default value combinations of control indicators in Customizing.

Menu path in IMG: Quality Management → Quality Planning → Basic Data → Inspection Characteristic, Inspection Method → Define Default Values for Control Indicators..

When creating a master inspection characteristic, the Quality Planner can select an entry from the list of predefined combinations and the system automatically sets the contained control indicators in the newly created characteristic.

Whether or not the Quality Planner can change the predefined values depends on the Customizing settings. Example: If your company works in a regulated environment and you only want to use predefined and validated inspection scenarios, you might not want the Quality Planner to be able to change control indicators. In this case, the Application Consultant sets the flag Fixed Indicators in the control indicator setting.

The following image shows which data the Quality Planner maintains when creating a master inspection characteristic:

On the initial screen, the Quality Planner enters the technical key, the plant, the validity date, and (if applicable) the referenced class characteristic. In the latter case, the default values are taken from the class characteristic values and cannot be changed in the master inspection characteristic.

On the next screen, the Quality Planner maintains the characteristic type (→ qualitative or quantitative), the usage scenario (→ (in)complete copy model or reference characteristic), and the status. Then, they maintain additional information that depends on the business scenario.

When the Quality Planner creates a master inspection characteristic, the status Being created is proposed. To be able to use the master inspection characteristic, the status must be set to Released when you completed the creation of the characteristic.

The following options are available for the usage scenario:

Incomplete Copy Model: It is not necessary to completely maintain the master inspection characteristic at creation. The missing entries can be added in the task list. For example, you define a quantitative characteristic length. However, since the length depends on the material to be inspected, the Quality Planner enters the target value of the length in the inspection plan.

Complete Copy Model: The master inspection characteristic must be completely maintained at creation. For example, you already know which packaging materials are available and this information does not depend on the material to be inspected. If you maintain this information in the master inspection characteristic, the system copies this information into the inspection plan when you add the characteristic. If necessary, you can still change the characteristic specifications, although we recommend to use an incomplete copy model in this case.

Reference Characteristic: The master inspection characteristic must be completely maintained at creation. When linking the master inspection characteristic to a task list or material specification, the characteristic is locked.

Whether to use an incomplete or complete copy model or reference characteristic mainly depends on the following questions: Do you want to change the characteristic in the plan? If there are changes, do you want to change the characteristic at a central place and automatically propagate the change to all plans? If the question to your first (second) question is no (yes), then use a reference characteristic. Otherwise, use copy models.

In other screens, the Quality Planner maintains additional information. For example, they can maintain the characteristic texts in several languages, enter value limits (→ quantitative characteristics), link catalogs for results recording (→ qualitative characteristics) or automatic defect creation (→ if enabled via a control key). To describe how a measurement must be performed, they can link inspection methods or use the characteristics long text.

From time to time, as Quality Planner, you must update the properties of the master inspection characteristics, for example if technical specifications or regulatory values changed. You can perform changes to master inspection characteristics with and without history.

To enforce changes with history, the Application Consultant enables this function on plant level in the Customizing (IMG Path Quality Management → Basic Settings → Maintain Settings at Plant Level).

In the following video, Petra shares an example how changing master inspection characteristic with history is managed in SAP S/4HANA.

The following example applies to changing with history and shows a master inspection characteristic in two versions:

The following occurs if the Quality Planner changes master inspection characteristics that are referenced (→ Reference Characteristic in the field Copy Model/Reference Characteristic) in a task list, a material specification, or a certificate profile:

• If you change this basic data without history, the changed data of the referenced master inspection characteristics is immediately and automatically updated in the task list, material specification, and certificate profile since the Planner changed a master inspection characteristic that is already in use.

• If you change this basic data with history, the changed data is not automatically updated in the task list or material specification since there will be a new version with the change.

Furthermore, the system automatically performs the following algorithm when changing basic data with history:

The Quality Planner changes a referenced characteristic with history and saves the data (step 1). The system asks whether the old version should be replaced by a new version (step 2). If the Planner chooses no, nothing happens and you continue using the old version of the master inspection characteristic. This makes sense if you only want to use the new version in newly created plans.

If the Planner chooses Yes, the system asks for a key date for replacement (and, if used, an engineering change number) (Step 3). Then, the system performs the where-used list to find out where the master inspection characteristic is used (Step 4). The Planner selects one or more task lists to be updated and chooses execute. Finally, the system performs the replacements and displays the results list (Step 5).