Designing and Building a Service Solution in SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition
In this lesson, you will find brief descriptions of the various solution processes covered throughout this course. You will be able to dive deeper into what each solution process has to offer in the following units.
When designing and implementing a solution in SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, service these individual solution processes, or scope items, can be thought of as prepackaged modular components, or "building blocks". An implementation project may require all or just a few of these building blocks to create a solution that fits the business needs identified for the customer.
Just as the scope items are somewhat modular in nature, you can also navigate this course to focus on the specific scope items that interest you. To make it easier to find what you need, the units in this course indicate the scope items covered within them by including the scope item codes in parenthesis in the unit title.
Grouping in the SAP Signavio Process Navigator
You can use the SAP Signavio Process Navigator (https://me.sap.com/processnavigator) to access the documentation and the details of the various solution processes that are part of SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, service. Here, the mentioned solution processes are grouped into the following two categories:
- Service Master Data & Agreement Management
- Service Operations & Processes
Core Solution Processes - Creating and Managing Documents to Provide Services and Bill Customers
Service Order Management and Monitoring (3D2) is one of the core scope items of the SAP S/4HANA Cloud - Service solution. It encompasses:
- Service planning
- Service order creation & release
- Service confirmation
- Customer billing
Service Management with Advanced Variant Configuration (6GS) is very similar to Service Order Management and Monitoring (3D2), but offers additional support for the use of configurable products in the core service documents.
Service Order Processing with SAP Field Service Management (49X) facilitates the integration of SAP S/4HANA Cloud service order processing and SAP Field Service Management. Once a service order is created and released in SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, service, a service call and the corresponding activities are automatically created in SAP Field Service Management.
Service Quotation (4GA) can be used to offer price estimates to customers for one or more services to be performed. Several scenarios are supported in terms of how pricing is set up for these documents. Accepted quotations are automatically converted to service orders. Service quotations can also include configurable products when using Service Management with Advanced Variant Configuration (6GS).
In-House Repair (3XK) can be used with, or without, service orders. It provides a specific solution for businesses that provide this type of in-house service. In some cases this may include businesses that do not include service products as a core offering, such as retail or manufacturing businesses. This scope facilitates:
- Pre-checks and repair planning
- Repair execution and documentation of required time and materials
- Customer billing for services performed
Service Contract Management (3MO) allows for the creation of service contracts which are created directly within SAP S/4HANA Cloud or synchronized from an external system (or from multiple external systems). This scope item also allows for the management of contracts including things such as price changes and automatic renewals.
Service Contract Management with Advanced Variant Configuration (6GU) is very similar to Service Contract Management (3MO), but adds functionality to allow for the inclusion of configurable service products.
Process Solutions to Extend and Support Core Service Offerings
Recurring Services (4X5) can be used to plan, schedule, and organize periodic services that occur at certain intervals. A recurring service can be implemented using the maintenance plan functionality using various counters such as time-based or performance-based cycles. These counters can also be combined (for example: the number of hours combined with kilometers driven).
Solution Order (4GT) can be used to create a central document for an end customer, encompassing all orders and contracts for a specific customer offering. Solution orders support business transformations, from products to higher-margin services and solutions by combining products and services in one order.
Procurement for Service Management (3NI) covers the integration of a service management solution with procurement. For example, it allows the automatic creation of a purchase requisition for materials required with reference to a service order line item.
Intercompany Billing for Service Documents (53Y) provides a solution for companies working in different regions with separate legal entities, or with affiliates and other third-party partners, to keep clear and transparent accounting documents.
Credit Memo Processing for Service Management (4GG) enables the creation of a credit memo request with reference to an (original) invoice. This can be done within a service process in which service contracts are used, or within a service process where service orders are directly invoiced (based on a confirmation) to the customer.
Scope item Warranty Claim Management - Supplier Recovery Processing (5HR) enables the creation of a warranty claim that can be forwarded to the respective supplier for a reimbursement.
Scope item Warranty Claim Management - Customer Claim Processing (63Y) enables the creation and validation of a warranty claim for reimbursement to a customer.
Service Monitoring and Analytics (43B) helps to ensure on-time service delivery by allowing for the monitoring of service orders for completeness or errors, and to help identify potential risks regarding service delivery dates. Analytics can also give a high level view of the performance of service processes to help a company track and meet it's performance goals.
Event-Based Revenue Recognition - Service Documents (3M3, 3M4, 3M5) allows you to manage revenue recognition for your service contracts with customers if you want to distribute your service-related revenue evenly on a periodic basis (e.g. monthly). This is done based on a billing plan that you set up in advance. There is also a method to base this process on service confirmations. The 3 process solutions designed to manage this are based on the accounting standards used.
Adapting the Solution
SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, service contains pre-configured content: the scope items presented earlier. Some of these scope items allow or even require some limited configuration. So-called Self-Service Configuration User Interfaces (SSCUIs) are used to do this.
The creation of service teams and some pricing-related configuration settings are some examples of what can be configured for the SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, service.
As an example, the figure Self-Service Configuration User Interface Options for Service shows some of the options available for the service line of business.
You can find more information as to what can or needs to be configured in the units of this course dealing with the individual scope items.
NoteAnother way of configuring your system is by using Central Business Configuration (CBC).
See also https://learning.sap.com and then especially unit 5 (Configuring SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, Service) from the course SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition Onboarding Fundamentals, which is part of the learning journey Onboarding with SAP Activate for SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition.