Allocating Lots to Orders

This chapter provides an overview of lot allocation and discusses how to process lot-allocated orders.

Understanding Lot Allocation

Using PeopleSoft Inventory and Order Management lot allocation, you specify the lot ID and its quantity for fulfilling a line on a sales order or material stock request. Lot allocation is an optional feature set up for Inventory business units. You must enable the feature to process orders of configured products. To allocate or deallocate lot quantities online, select the Allow Lot Allocation option on the Inventory Definition - Business Unit Options page.

When entering a material stock request in PeopleSoft Inventory in the Create/Update Stock Request component, you can select the Allocate Lot option on the Line Menu field to access the Allocate Lots page where you can select specific item lot IDs to fulfill an order line. When entering a sales order in PeopleSoft Order Management, you can lot allocate the order and schedule lines for lot-control items when you select the Allocate Lot option on the Line Menu field located in the Order Line Entry region of the Order Entry Form page or on the Shipment Schedules page. While entering orders, you can lot allocate a line to multiple lots or partially lot allocate the line. You can also make changes to the lot allocations on the sales order pages, depending on the stage of fulfillment processing for the line.

Use the Allocate Lots page in the Fulfill Stock Orders menu to:

• Lot allocate a line that was not lot allocated during order entry.

• Change a lot allocation for an order that has not started fulfillment processing.

If you are allocating lots for sales orders, you can partially lot allocate order and schedule lines for the lot-controlled item; therefore, you lot allocate only part of the requested quantity of a particular order or schedule line. An order is eligible for partial lot allocation, when you activate the ship partial quantity option for the customer, and backorders created for the line should not be automatically canceled. When allocating lots for material stock requests, planned demand, or sourced demand in PeopleSoft Inventory, you must fully lot allocate the line, lot allocating the total line quantity for the lot-controlled item to one or more lots.

To enable partial lot allocation, both the Partials (partial quantity flag) and the Cancel Backorder flag must be clear on the Ship Options tab in the Order Line Entry region of the Order Entry Form page or on the Shipment Schedules - Ship Options page. These fields appear by default from the buying agreement on the Header - Terms page, if referenced, or the General Information - Ship To Options page, or the Order Group Shipping Terms page, depending on how you set up your customers.

Note. You cannot lot allocate any demand lines that already have pre-allocations for pegging. If a demand line is completely or partially pegged, then you cannot lot-allocate the demand line. This includes lines that have an open peg or lines that have been allocated due to a peg.

Note. When allocating lots, keep in mind that you do not select the full item-lot-storage location combination. You select the lot and PeopleSoft Inventory determines the storage location from which the quantity is allocated, based on certain rules.

See Also

Managing Item Lots

Demand Sources

Backorders Created by Partial Lot Allocations

If you partially lot allocate the line quantity on a sales order, the system automatically creates two demand lines for the order or schedule line in the PeopleSoft Inventory tables. The first line is inserted into the IN_DEMAND tables, with the quantity equal to the total quantity that was lot allocated. The second line is recorded as a backorder for the unallocated quantity on the original order or schedule line.

Partial lot allocations create backorders, but do not generate ad hoc replenishment requisitions. If no quantity is available to fulfill the backorder created by the partial lot allocation, the Reserve Materials process (IN_FUL_RSV) creates a replenishment request for the backorder during fulfillment processing.

See Also

The Order Fulfillment Process

Replenishing Inventory

Partially Lot-Allocated Orders

The Order Release Request process runs against the demand tables and selects all eligible lines that match the search criteria. If the line was partially lot allocated, the allocated portion is automatically eligible for order release processing if theAuto Partial Qty Approval (automatic partial quantity approval) option is selected for the business unit on the Setup Fulfillment-Reservation page. If this option is not selected for the business unit, you must go to the Shortage Workbench, select the order line and then choose the Approve Partial Quantity option in the Action field before the Order Release process can include the allocated portion of a partially allocated order line on a pick batch ID.

See Also

Picking Inventory

Lot Allocations

To facilitate changes in how a particular order or schedule line is lot allocated, the system manages backordered lines associated with partial lot allocations in the background. You can change the lot allocation of the line using the Allocate Lots page. You can make changes only until the lot-allocated portion of the order or schedule line has been released for picking or the associated backordered line (if any) has been set to the releasable state.

The system automatically changes the quantity on the associated backorder line to reflect your updates. If you fully lot allocate a partially lot-allocated line, the system deletes the associated backorder line. Likewise, if you partially allocate an eligible fully lot-allocated order or schedule line, the system creates an associated backorder for the deallocated quantity.

After the Order Release process prints the lot-allocated order line, you cannot change how a particular order line is lot allocated. In PeopleSoft Order Management, the Allocate Lots page is unavailable for entry but displays how the quantity is allocated. Any unallocated quantity indicates that an associated backorder exists for the order. If the backorder has not begun fulfillment processing in PeopleSoft Inventory, you can lot allocate the full backordered quantity manually using the Allocate Lots page in the Fulfill Stock Orders menu.

Note. All backordered lines must be fully lot allocated, regardless of how the backorder is generated.

If soft reservation processing is enabled for the requested item and the item line is not part of an order for a configured product, the Reserve Materials process automatically moves any lines, including backordered lines, to the releasable state for fulfillment when quantities becomes available. You cannot lot allocate any lines processed by Reserve Materials process. However, if Reserve Materials process creates a backorder for an order line, you can fully lot allocate the backorder line using the Allocate Lots page in the Fulfill Stock Orders menu.

For lines that have been processed by Reserve Materials process but included on a pick batch ID, you can use the Material Picking Feedback page to unpick the order line and then use the Shortage Workbench to release the reserved quantity and move the line back to the unfulfilled state. Once unreserved, you can lot allocate the order or schedule line from the sales order pages in PeopleSoft Order Management or from the Allocate Lots page in the Fulfill Stock Orders menu.

The following table summarizes the changes that you can make to partial lot allocations, depending on the fulfillment state of the order line and the page that you are using to make the change.

See Also

Fulfillment Process Exceptions

Promising and Reserving Inventory

Processing Lot-Allocated Orders

Sales orders received from PeopleSoft Order Management with lot allocations bypass the Reserve Materials process. Lot allocations made in PeopleSoft Order Management are put directly into the releasable state, where they can be picked up by the Order Release process for picking. Orders with lot allocations received from other demand sources are put directly into the releasable state if you have chosen the releasable option for the Non Soft Reserve State field on the Setup Fulfillment page and the item does not use soft-reserve.

Note. Sales orders that bypass Reserve Materials process inherit the default auto-processing settings defined on the Setup Fulfillment component.

When you save the sales order or material stock request, the system uses the lot-allocated quantity to update the following quantities:

• Reserved quantity and available quantity for the business unit-item combination (if soft reservations processing is in effect for the item).

• Allocated quantity and available quantity for the lots from which quantity was allocated.

• Reserved or allocated quantity at the storage location level.

  When you save the lot-allocated sales order or material stock request, the system determines which storage locations to allocate from in the following order:

  1. Items that are not part of a storage container and have a stocking unit of measure (UOM) that matches the UOM of the order line.

  2. Items that are part of a storage container and have a stocking UOM that matches the UOM of the order line.

  3. Items that are not part of a storage container and have a stocking UOM that does not match the UOM of the order line.

  4. Items that are part of a storage container and have a stocking UOM that does not match the UOM of the order line.

  5. If multiple storage locations satisfy a particular criterion, these storage locations are sorted in ascending alphanumeric order and quantity allocated accordingly.

The quantity updates normally performed by Reserve Materials process and Order Release process with a Create Allocations action are performed when you save the lot allocation, either when entering the sales order or material stock request or from the Allocate Lots page in the Fulfill Stock Orders menu.

This section discusses how to:

1. Process orders for configured products.

2. Allocate lots manually.

3. Allocate lot quantities for online entries.

Pages Used to Process Lot-Allocated Orders

Processing Orders for Configured Products

The Reserve Materials process does not pick up lines for orders of configured products. To start the fulfillment process for these orders, lot allocate the quantity manually using either the:

• Sales order pages in PeopleSoft Order Management.

• Allocate Lots page in the Fulfill Stock Orders menu.

If the Lot Allocation workflow is enabled on the Inventory Definition - Business Unit Options page, the system notifies designated users that the quantity is available for the configured order line when the production ID for the configured item in PeopleSoft Manufacturing has been completed and put away in PeopleSoft Inventory. When designated users process the corresponding worklist entries, the system automatically transfers them to the Allocate Lots page, so they can lot allocate the quantity.

Note. The Lot Allocation workflow is activated for only that quantity received from PeopleSoft Manufacturing. You are not notified about quantities received from purchase orders or recorded in the Express Putaway component.

Allocating Lots Manually

Access the Allocate Lots page.

Allocate Lot button	Click to access the Allocate Lots page, where you can allocate quantities from a specific lot or lots.
Line (line number)	Any number greater than 1 in the column indicates a backorder line.
Config Code (configuration code) button	If the item is configured, click to access the Configuration Code Information page, where you can view the configuration code assigned to the item.

Note. If you allocated from a lot with an availability date after, or an expiration date before, the scheduled ship date on the order line, the system displays a warning message when you save the component.

See Also

Managing Item Lots

Working With Configuration Codes

Allocating Lot Quantities for Online Entries

Access the Lot Allocation page.

You must have some lot quantity available, even in environments that permit negative quantity balances. You cannot perform lot allocations that drive available quantity negative.

Note. The Lot Allocation page does not process any demand lines that already have pre-allocations that are not lot-allocated. This page does not lot-allocate demand lines that have an open peg, nor lines that have been allocated due to a peg.