Siebel Order Management Guide Addendum for Communications > Employee Asset-Based Ordering >

Building a Hierarchy of Orders

You can define a dependency between orders in Siebel CRM by pointing an order to another order as a parent order. In the order fulfillment system, a parent order must be processed before the child orders of that parent. This allows you to build a hierarchy of related orders, so an order that you designate as a parent order is fulfilled before orders you designate as child orders of that parent.

For example, suppose a company with a headquarters office and three branch offices wants to order the equipment for a new computer network. Some of the equipment must be installed at the company headquarters, while other equipment must go to the branch offices. The equipment must be up and running at headquarters in order for the equipment at the branch offices to function. In Siebel Communications, you can distribute the equipment into four orders: a parent order for the company headquarters and three associated child orders, one for each of the branch offices. Fulfillment of the parent order must predate fulfillment of the child orders. This functionality helps to make sure that the headquarters office receives its allotment of network equipment first, so this equipment can be installed before the equipment destined for the branch offices.

You can build a multilevel hierarchy by selecting child orders as parent orders of other (grandchild) orders.

NOTE:  Certain validations and limits apply to which orders can be child orders and parent orders. For more information, see Restrictions and Requirements for a Parent-Child Order Relationship.

Designating a Parent Order for an Order

To designate a parent order for an order, follow this procedure.

To designate a parent order for an order

1. Navigate to the Sales Orders screen, then the List view.
2. In the Sales Orders list, find the order you want to be the child order; in other words, the order for which you want to designate a parent order.
3. Drill down on the link in the Order # field, and click the Line Items view tab.
4. In the Parent Order # field of the order header, select the parent order for this order, and click OK.

   The drop-down list of the Parent Order # field shows only the orders that do not violate any restrictions on parent orders.

   For more information about restrictions on parent orders, see Restrictions and Requirements for a Parent-Child Order Relationship.

5. When finished preparing the order, click Submit.

   Along with the order, the integration passes the parent-child order relationship to the fulfillment system.

Restrictions and Requirements for a Parent-Child Order Relationship

The following validations and limits apply to parent orders and child orders:

• The Status field of a parent order can have any value except Complete, Canceled, Rejected, or As Submitted.
• An order cannot be a parent order if the order is inactive and the value of the Status field is Complete, Canceled, Rejected, or As Submitted. Orders with these status values are not available for selection in the Parent Order # field.

  NOTE:  Only the Status values of Pending, Submitted, Complete, Canceled, Rejected, and Inactive are used in Siebel Communications. You can hide other Status values by changing the pick applet search specification of the Status field.

• A child order cannot be its own parent.
• A child order cannot be submitted before its parent order is submitted.
• The latest due date of the parent order line items must be earlier than the earliest due date of the child order line items. In other words, all parent order line items must be completed before processing of any child order line items can begin.
• The parent order line item with the latest due date of any of the parent order line items must have an earlier due date than the earliest due date of any of the child order line items. In other words, all parent order line items must be completed before processing of any child order line items can begin.
• In the case of a multilevel order hierarchy, Siebel CRM validates the dates of each child order level only against the dates of its immediate parent.

  For example, in the case of a three-level order hierarchy with one parent, one child, and one grandchild, the dates of the grandchild order line items are validated against the dates of the child order (parent of the grandchild) line items, but not against the dates of the ultimate parent order line items.

• A child order cannot be submitted if the parent order has not been submitted.
• After a parent order has been selected for a child order, you can select a different parent order for that child order.
• If a parent order is revised after it is linked to a child order, then child order references are not automatically updated.

  For example, if you submit a revision of a parent order, then a child order of that parent order remains associated with the original version of the order (Revision 1). To maintain the parent-child order relationship with the currently active version of the parent order, you must manually change the parent order to Revision 2 in the Parent Order # field of the child order.