SAP Batch Handling: Mara-Xchpf Marc-Xchpf
SAP Batch Handling: Mara-Xchpf Marc-Xchpf
SAP Batch Handling: Mara-Xchpf Marc-Xchpf
What is a batch no. of a materail? and where can we mention batch no for material? Can
we maintain batch no in mm01 Tcode while creating material?
In simple terms SAP Batch Handling means an additional keys fields for users to identify the
same materials.
The structure of the material master record allows you to manage stocks of a material by value
at plant level or company-code level and by quantity down to storage-location level. Under
certain conditions, you may need to make further subdivisions for a material and manage
batches.
Certain materials' features cannot always be guaranteed to be exactly alike in production. For
example, you cannot guarantee that a certain color will always have the same shade. Minor
differences between production lots cannot be avoided. You need to be able to uniquely identify
the individual production lots of the same material and manage them separately in inventory.
Materials that require such precise identification, for example pharmaceutical products, are
identified and managed in stock not only according to material number, but also according to
batch number.
With batch handling, you can manage not only production lots from in-house production, but
also production lots from vendors as separate entities.
In the standard R/3 System, numbers are assigned to the individual materials at plant level.
- General data on the batch (for example, shelf life expiry date, date of the last goods receipt),
which is defined in the master batch. The master batch applies to all storage locations in which
the batch is located. No stocks are managed at this level.
- Stock data, which is managed separately for every storage location in which the batch is
located.
For example, if the batch C1 of a material is spread across two different storage locations, the
stock quantity is tracked for each storage location.
This blog offers a quick guide on how to use standard SAP Batch Determination for a material
transfer. For an internal goods movement we need SAP to pick the batch from stock with the
earliest Shelf Life Expiration Date (SLED). We don’t want our fresh products terminate
themselves from stock…
1. For this we will be using standard IM search strategy ME001 – Standard Search Procedure.
IMG > Logistics > Batch Management > Batch Determination and Batch Check > Batch Search
Procedure Definition > Define Inventory Management Search Procedure
IM Search Procedure
The search procedure consists of three condition types that is plenty to us. We want the
determination rule to be activated when we use Movement type 311 (Mvt from SLoc to SLoc) in
Plant X for only a specific material. ME01 condition seems to fit this purpose.
2. Now we need to activate the search procedure for the movement type, otherwise it will not
even begin to look for a determination procedure in the first place.
IMG > Logistics > Batch Management > Batch Determination and Batch Check > Batch Search
Procedure Activation and Check Activation > Allocate IM Search Procedure/Activate Check
Activate procedure
We add the Search procedure to movement type 311 and check the check box so that manually
entered batch codes are validated as well.
IMG > Logistics > Batch Management > Batch Determination and Batch Check > Define Sort
Rule
For the rule we use standard Batch Characteristic LOBM_VFDAT. This is the SLED. We need
earliest batches first so we choose ‘Ascending’.
Now we did all necessary customizing. It may be necessary to create batch classes with
classifications if you are not already using this. If your products are batch managed already, your
materials should already be assigned a batch class in the material master. This class we will also
be using in the batch determination.
4. The last step is to create a search strategy, much like message determination for document
output (if you never did this, then never mind this comparison).
SAP Menu > Logistics > Central Functions > Batch Management > Batch Determination >
Batch Search Strategy > For Inventory Management > MBC1 – Create
We will use strategy type ME01 and key combination Movement Type/ Plant and Material.
Remember that we want the search procedure only to work for one material at time of goods
transfer in one plant. If you want you can extend the procedure to all materials for movement
type 311. In this case choose key combination: Movement Type/Plant. It’s that easy.
Here we actually enter the criteria when the batch determination should be activated: movement
311, material MRP and plant 3000. You can choose settings with regards to batch splits and
whether determination should occur in dialogue mode or background. For details F1 your way
through these options.
Last but not least: enter Selection criteria and Sort rule by pressing the buttons in the task bar.
For selection criteria you can e.g. say SLED > 01.01.2009. It is a minimum requirement that the
procedure needs. Be selecting a SLED date in the past I’m assuming that all batches are in scope
(at the same I assume that expired products are taken off the shelf in time so I will not use it in
my delivery process).
I will use the sort rule I created in the previous step: sort by SLED.