Understanding the Engineering Change Order Process

Use engineering change orders (ECOs) to plan, approve, and implement product changes. The creator of the ECO typically performs several tasks, such as setting up the approval routing master, reviewing and modifying the UDCs, and setting up next numbers.

Before you create an ECO, you might want to determine whether one already exists for the change. Use the ECO Workbench program (P30225) to review and manage ECO information and to determine the progress of an ECO.

You must first define the ECO number and codes that determine its priority, status, effective dates, and so on. Later, you must define the routing instruction, parts list, and detail information. If you specify a parent work order number on the ECO, you can retrieve related work orders and review the history of a product.

To delete an ECO, you must first delete the ECO parts list and then delete the ECO.