Sales schedules in Enterprise Planning

In Sales you can use sales schedules for customers who regularly place orders for a relatively long period. Sales schedules support long-term sales with frequent deliveries. In a sales schedule you can store all the requirements for a specific item that are sold to a certain business partner.

A sales schedule consists of the following two parts:

A sequence shipping schedule: the confirmed part of the requirements. The shipping schedule contains detailed information about shipping times or delivery times and quantities of the ordered goods, and is defined on exact dates in a period, and for a relatively short period of time.
A material release: the forecasted part for a total plan period.

Sequence shipping schedule

Enterprise Planning handles sales orders that result from a sales schedule as normal sales orders and stores requirements that originate from the shipping schedule part as sales schedule orders of the Planned Issue transaction type in the Planned Inventory Transactions (whinp1500m000) session.

In Enterprise Planning, the shipping schedule part of the sales schedule is stored as customer order in the Item Master Plan (cprmp2101m000) session, and it is consumed from the forecast. In the Item Order Plan (cprrp0520m000) session, you can see the shipping schedule part as planned orders of type sales schedule.

Material Release

Enterprise Planning stores the requirements that originate from the material release part of the sales schedule in the Unconfirmed Customer Orders field of the Item Master Plan (cprmp2101m000) session. These requirements do not affect the planning process of Enterprise Planning, and are only displayed to show which part of the customer orders is not yet confirmed. In the Item Order Plan (cprrp0520m000) session, Enterprise Planning shows the sales requirements of the material release part of the sales schedule as sales schedule forecast.

Master planning and order planning

When you update or simulate the item master plan or the item order plan, Enterprise Planning reads goods flow data from the Planned Inventory Transactions (whinp1500m000) session to take into account sales quantities of the shipping schedule. To take into account sales quantities related to the material release of the sales schedule, Enterprise Planning reads the schedules with schedule type material release in the Sales Schedules (tdsls3111m000) session.

ATP updates

If order quantities or (delivery) dates in the shipping schedule or in the material release change, and you selected the Online ATP Update in EP check box in the Planning Parameters (cprpd0100m000) session, LN performs an ATP update for the item. This update is similar to the ATP update that Enterprise Planning carries out if anything changes in planned receipts or planned issues in the Planned Inventory Transactions (whinp1500m000) session. Enterprise Planning checks the acceptance of sales orders against the actual ATP value.

In case of changes, Enterprise Planning also sets two new net change dates, so that changes are taken into account during a planning run:

The net change date in the Item - Ordering (tcibd2100m000) session. This is the date from which on Enterprise Planning must take into account changes in the shipping schedule.
The net change date in the Items - Planning (cprpd1100m000) session. This is the date from which on Enterprise Planning must consider all other changes.

To perform an ATP update and to set new net change dates, Enterprise Planning reads goods flow data of the item. Enterprise Planning receives the dates and quantities that relate to the shipping schedule from the Inventory Planning module in Warehousing.

To perform an ATP update for changes in the material release part of the shipping schedule, Enterprise Planning receives data about the quantity and date for which sales requirements are needed from Sales.

Overlapping material release schedules: Extrapolation

Enterprise Planning receives the sales requirements related to the shipping schedule for a specific date from the Inventory Planning module, whereas it receives the sales requirements related to the material release as one quantity from the Sales Control module. Shipping schedules usually end in the middle of a plan period and, as a result, an overlap exists between the shipping schedule and the material release in a specific plan period. For this reason, LN distinguishes between material release schedules that overlap a shipping schedule, and material release schedules that do not overlap.

For material releases that overlap a shipping schedule, Sales uses the extrapolation method to determine sales quantities for the days that are not filled with sales requirements that originate from the shipping schedule.

The way in which LN extrapolates these quantities depends on whether or not you selected the Linear Estimate check box in the Items - Sales Business Partner (tdisa0510m000) session:

If you clear the Linear Estimate check box, LN subtracts the sales quantities of the shipping schedule from those of the material release for a certain plan period. Next, LN divides the resulting quantity over the days in the plan period that are not covered by shipping schedule quantities.
If you select the Linear Estimate check box, LN divides the material release quantity by the number of days in the plan period. Next, LN fills the days in the plan period that do not have shipping schedule quantities with the resulting value.

In the plan periods where the material release does not overlap the shipping schedule, Sales sends the total quantity of the material release to Enterprise Planning when it carries out an ATP check.

Another check box that plays an important role in the extrapolation process, is the Accumulate Demand on Start Date of Period check box in the Items - Sales Business Partner (tdisa0510m000) session:

If you select the Accumulate Demand on Start Date of Period, LN fills the first day of the plan period with the total quantity of the material release part of the sales schedule.
If you clear the Accumulate Demand on Start Date of Period check box, LN spreads the total quantity of the material release over the number of days of the plan period.

Example 1

Check box
Linear Estimate	selected
Accumulate Demand on Start Date of the Period	selected

In week 1, a material release takes place, but the entire period is filled by the shipping schedule, and Enterprise Planning only takes into account the shipping schedule.

In week 2, an overlap occurs: the week is not completely filled by the shipping schedule, so the remaining days are filled by the material release. Because the Linear Estimate check box is selected, LN extrapolates the quantity of the material release to the number of days in the period (50 : 5 = 10). The days that are not filled by the shipping schedule, receive the extrapolated quantity (10).

Week 3 only contains material release, and LN takes into account the related quantity. The first day of week 3 is filled with the total quantity of the material release, because the Accumulate Demand on Start Date of Period check box is selected.

Example 2

Check box
Linear Estimate	cleared
Accumulate Demand on Start Date of the Period	cleared

LN now distributes the material release in week 2 without linear estimate, because the Linear Estimate check box is not selected. As a result, Sales subtracts the shipping schedule quantity from the total material release quantity for the period, and divides the resulting quantity over the number of days that are not filled by shipping schedule quantities.

In week 3, LN equally spreads the total quantity of the material release over the number of days in the period, because you did not select the Accumulate Demand on Start Date of Period check box.

Example 3

Check box
Linear Estimate	cleared
Accumulate Demand on Start Date of the Period	cleared

The following example shows what happens if the quantity of the material release changes from 50 to 60 in week 2.

In week 2, the remaining quantity for each day that is not covered by the shipping schedule is now 13 (60 - 12 - 9 = 13). Sales informs Enterprise Planning that three material release quantities increase, and Enterprise Planning subsequently reduces the ATP values.

Example 4

The following example shows what happens if the quantity of the shipping schedule changes on a specific day.

Check box
Linear Estimate	cleared
Accumulate Demand on Start Date of the Period	cleared

The quantity of the shipping schedule on day 2 of week 2 changes from nine to 15. This change results in a change of the Planned Inventory Transactions (whinp1500m000) session, which is sent to Enterprise Planning for the ATP update.

Obviously, changes in the shipping schedule quantities also affect the material release for week 2. The new quantity for the remaining material release in week 2 in the example is 33 (60 - 12 - 15 = 33). The quantity for each of the remaining three days is then 11. Sales communicates this change to Enterprise Planning, which consequently increases the ATP figures.