Understanding Work Order Item Fulfillment from PeopleSoft Inventory

PeopleSoft Maintenance Management manages the maintenance and repair of a capitalized asset. Maintenance and repair of an asset may require parts from PeopleSoft Inventory. Work Orders from PeopleSoft Maintenance Management can place demand for items into a PeopleSoft Inventory business unit. Inventory fulfills the work order item by reserving stock for soft-reserve items (optional) and then using the Fulfill Work Order menu to pick and ship the items. The fulfillment steps of a work order item are different from the fulfillment flow of other demand sources, such as a sales order or a material stock request. The process flow is:

  1. Create a Work Order: A work order is created in PeopleSoft Maintenance Management with items to be fulfilled from inventory.

    A work order is a document authorizing work to be performed and cost to be incurred. Typically, work orders are generated to dispatch labor and material resources to perform construction tasks and maintenance related activities and to track the associated costs. A work order consists of one or more work order tasks. A task defines an individual activity to be performed. A task includes the labor and material resources needed; including a list of items needed from PeopleSoft Inventory. A task can require various resource types. Inventory items always have the resource type of material. A work order task could also include materials to be purchased using PeopleSoft Purchasing.

  2. Commit a work order line: If a work order task contains an inventory item, then the work order line is committed (or placed) into the demand fulfillment (IN_DEMAND) table based on the WO Task's commit rule.

    Once the work order line is a demand line within PeopleSoft Inventory, the item quantity can be fulfilled. A committed work order line can be pre-allocated.

  3. Reserve a work order line: With soft-reservation processing, part of the inventory business unit's total available quantity for the item is reserved for a demand line and cannot be consumed by other demand lines staged for fulfillment processing.

    If a work order task contains a soft-reserve item, then the item can be reserved in PeopleSoft Inventory. This is an optional step depending on the needs of your organization.

  4. Generate a pick plan: Create a pick plan for the items needed for a work order.

    This is an optional step depending on the needs of your organization. Use the Work Order Pick Plan process page in PeopleSoft Inventory to generate a pick plan. You can select work order demand lines that have been previously reserved or all work orders that need to be fulfilled. In addition, the pick plan can commit, reserve, or allocate demand lines.

  5. Issue the needed stock from inventory: Use the Issue to Work Orders component in PeopleSoft Inventory to issue items to the work order.

    This is the shipping step, however, in most cases the inventory item is picked up by a technician or delivered directly to a job site. Items can be issued to a work order demand line with or without a previously generating pick plan.

  6. Return any unused stock to inventory: Once the work is completed, the technician can return any unused material back to the Inventory business unit using the Issue to Work Orders component.

Note: When work order parts are committed to PeopleSoft Inventory, they are inserted as demand lines into the IN_DEMAND table with a demand source of WM and a fulfillment state (IN_FULFILL_STATE) of pending. Work order demand lines do not follow the same fulfillment process as demand lines from sales orders or material stock requests. Instead, work order demand lines stay in the pending state during reservations, allocations, and picking. When the work order task is set to a status of completed, then the work order demand line in PeopleSoft Inventory is set to the depleted state. The fulfillment states of unfulfilled, releasable, released, confirmed, and shipped are not used for work order demand lines.

Work Order Items

In order to put an item ID on a work order, the item must be in active, hold, or discontinued status on the Define Item component and, for inventory items, on the Define Business Unit Item component. When working with inventory items on a work order parts list, keep in mind the following:

  • Staged date items are not allowed on a work order parts list.

  • Configured items are not allowed on a work order parts list.

  • Product kits are not allowed on a work order parts list.

  • Soft-reserve items on a work order can be reserved in PeopleSoft Inventory.

  • ATP items on a work order cannot be promised in PeopleSoft Inventory; they are treated as non-soft reserve items.

  • Lot controlled items cannot be lot-allocated.

  • PeopleSoft Supply Planning does not recognize items on a work order parts list as a demand source.

Pegging Work Orders

A work order inventory schedule row can be pegged to a requisition, purchase order, or interunit transfer. Work orders that are not yet committed, are automatically committed when a peg is created. Pegging enables you to secure parts that may be in short supply or special order. Once the parts are received and putaway into the inventory business unit, the system can create a reservation or allocation of the stock to the work order that was pegged. You can then create a pick plan or issue the parts. When pegged quantity is putaway, a notification is sent to the Work Order Contact person.

If you plan to peg work order lines, it is important to remember that the open pegged quantity is not available on the Work Order Pick Plan or the Issue to Work Orders component. If there is available quantity in the inventory business unit and you have open pegged quantity on the work order line, then you cannot issue the available quantity to fulfill the pegged quantity. You must first clear the peg between the work order line and the supply source using the Pegging Workbench, then issue the available quantity. For example, if the work order line requires 10 units and you have pegged 6 units, then the Work Order Pick Plan or the Issue to Work Orders component display 4 units to issue.