SAP Credit Management assists in making effective credit decisions. The system includes features to identify payment default risks early and aids credit controllers in swift decision-making.
The following steps, which will be detailed in the upcoming screens, allow you to customize or adjust initial settings.
If Credit Management is active, the internal processes of Contract Accounts Receivable and Payable (for example, creditworthiness) derive the data from Credit Management. If it is not required, you can disable it in this customizing path.
Set up credit segments to determine your business partner's credit limit. With SAP Credit Management, define segments relevant to your company or industry. These segments will later be assigned to the business partner's master record.
Credit segments are necessary for calculating credit limits and enable thorough checks at the business partner level. Additionally, when creating a credit segment, you choose the currency for all credit-related assessments.
Here, you can specify the customer credit groups you need. These groups can be used to categorize business partners and serve as selection criteria for reporting and worklist generation.
For example, customer credit groups might include domestic and foreign customers, regular customers, and insured customers.
Create new rules for calculating the score and credit limit or change existing rules.
- Create the rule required for calculating the score and credit limit.
- To ensure the calculation of the score, define under the folder "Score" the corresponding formula for the rule and all other data required.
- To ensure the calculation of the credit limit, define under the folder "Credit Limit" the corresponding formula for the rule and the credit segment, along with all other necessary data.
- To consider external credit information, define under the folder "Select Rating Procedure" the external rating procedures that you want to include in the respective score and credit limit calculations.
Define formulas for calculating scores and credit limits. Differentiate between customer types using various parameters like risk class or country/region key. Define formulas either in SAP Fiori apps (recommended) or using the BAdI for Score and Credit Limit Calculation. Create a formula, assign a result type, and choose the logic source.
If using Fiori apps, define logic in "Manage Formulas in Credit Management" or "Manage Credit Management Rules" and if using BAdI, configure it in the Custom Logic app, ensuring proper authorization and setup.
Set Up Risk Classes for SAP Credit Management
You have the flexibility to define multiple risk classes. The system can automatically assign a risk class to a business partner based on their score, or you can manually set it. Automatically determined risk classes can be manually overridden in the business partner’s master data record.
Requirements
Automatic risk class calculation is managed through the assignment of follow-on processes to event types. To enable this feature, configure the EVL_RISK_C (Determine Risk Class) follow-on process in the "Define Events and Follow-On Processes" Customizing activity.
Activities
To enable automatic risk class assignment based on creditworthiness value, you need to map score intervals to their corresponding risk classes.
Specify Reasons for Blocking a Credit Account
You have the flexibility to define various reasons for blocking a credit account according to your needs. When a business partner is blocked, the credit analyst will see the specified block reason in the credit segment data within the Control screen area. Additionally, you can utilize predefined event types. Example block reasons could include:
- Poor score
- Insolvency
- High-risk country
- Poor payment behavior
Set Up Custom Automatic Credit Checks
The automatic credit check can focus on specific aspects and trigger at various points during order processing. In this activity, you can create your own credit checks tailored to your Credit Management requirements.
You can configure an automatic credit check based on any combination of the following:
- Credit Segment
- Risk Class
- Credit Group
For each credit check, you can set a system response, such as a warning message. If a warning message is issued, a block can be applied to the credit status of a document. When defining automatic credit checks, you can also specify conditions that will block a document or prevent the forwarding of material requirements to MRP. This is outlined in the Customizing section for making default settings for Credit Management.
In this activity, you assign a sales area to a credit segment.
Credit checks can occur at various stages during order processing. For delivery creation, you can also specify whether the automatic credit check should take place at the time of delivery creation and/or goods issue. You can define the sales document types for which a credit check should be performed. Here, delivery types can be controlled separately and specifically at the time of goods issue.
Credit checks may occur at various stages during order processing. When creating deliveries, you can also designate whether the automatic credit check happens at the time of delivery creation and/or during the goods issue. You can select which types of sales documents should undergo a credit check. Moreover, different delivery types can be managed separately during goods issue.
A check rule can include multiple individual checks, and you can specify which parameters are relevant for each check step. To create a check rule, follow these steps:
- Select Check Rule and enter the required data. Here, you can also set it as the default check rule.
- To define the check steps needed for the check rule, select Checks.
- To manage currency-dependent parameters at the credit segment level, select Credit Segment and enter the required data.
In this configuration step, you establish the necessary dependencies between various events and the processes they trigger within SAP Credit Management. Define the required dependencies between different events that can occur during the processing of SAP Credit Management and the processes in SAP Credit Management that should be initiated when these events happen. For instance, if a business partner's score changes, it should also cause the risk class to be updated accordingly.
Using the configuration task, configure the required information categories for SAP Credit Management. These categories can include additional details in the business partner's credit profile, which can be referred to during credit limit checks.
This configuration task allows you to assign company codes to credit segments. First, you allocate the company code to a credit segment. Next, you must ensure that the appropriate credit limit is defined for the credit segments and/or for individual customers.
Credit groups can be utilized to consolidate various document types for credit management purposes. After assigning document types to a credit group, they will be treated uniformly during the credit check.
You configure credit groups in the following steps:
- Define Automatic Credit Control
- Set Credit Limit Checks for Sales Document Types
- Set Credit Limit Checks for Delivery Types
The system provides the following default settings:
- 01 Credit Group for Sales Order
- 02 Credit Group for Delivery
- 03 Credit Group for Goods Issue
In this task, you determine for each item category whether items of that category should be included in credit management processes, such as credit checks and updates to open credit values.
The system lists all valid item categories for selection. Check the "Credit Active" box for each item category that should be considered for credit checks.