Understanding Supplier Release Scheduling Setup

To perform supplier release scheduling, you need to set up information for each of the suppliers and for the items that you are planning to purchase. The information that is required to generate supplier release schedules varies, depending on whether you want to generate schedules that are based on blanket orders or ad hoc schedules. You can enter ad hoc schedules interactively through the self-service portal work spaces or generate them when running the Supplier Schedule Generation program (R34400).

If you want to schedule releases against blanket orders, you set up supplier schedule master information that is tied to a blanket order, such as:

• Shipment pattern and dates.

  This setup indicates the days of the week that you accept deliveries.

• Supplier split percentages.

  You use this value to use more than one supplier for an item.

• Frozen days

  You use this value to specify the time period after the schedule generation date during which quantities cannot be changed and no releases are permitted.

• Releasable schedule days

  Releasable schedule days indicate the time fence from the schedule generation date for releasing committed quantities.

To create ad hoc schedules, you can set up shipment patterns and dates, as well as split percentages without a blanket order; and use information set up for the item in the Item Branch program (P41026), such as:

• Supplier

• Freeze fence

You do not have to set up a release fence for ad hoc schedules until you actually run the Supplier Schedule Release Generation program (R34410). You use a processing option to define the period in days from the generation start date within which committed quantities can be converted into purchase orders.