Understanding Blanket Order Release
You can create sales orders for customers with blanket orders or quotes. You use the Release Blankets program (P420111) to manually deduct item quantities from a blanket order. The system creates a sales order for the quantity that you specify. The system maintains any remaining balance on the blanket order for future orders. The system also indicates when the sales order quantity exceeds the blanket order quantity.
The system consolidates order lines based on sold to, branch/plant, and currency code information. The order numbers that you enter can be consolidated in the same way as the system-generated sales orders. For example, if you select multiple records to release and enter a new order number for the first record only, the system consolidates the orders.
When you release a blanket order, you can specify the sales order number when you verify the release date and quantity. The system checks the order number and line type combinations for duplicates. If duplicates are found, the system stops processing the order and displays an error message that the document number exists. You must assign a unique order number to the order before the system processes the sales order. If you do not enter an order number, the system generates the sales order number using next numbers.
The system lets you release single or multiple blanket orders automatically or manually, and you can specify whether a blanket order is selected by default when multiple blankets meet the identification criteria.
If multiple blanket orders exist for a customer, such as orders received using electronic purchase orders (EDI 850 orders), you can ensure that the system automatically identifies a sales order blanket to be released. To reduce the chances of multiple blankets meeting the processing criteria, you can process blanket orders based on these values:
Sold to address and item number.
Ship to address and item number.
Sold to address, item number, and customer purchase order (PO).
Ship to address, item number, and customer PO.
Delivered to address and item number.
Delivered to address, item number, and customer PO.
You can release multiple blanket orders simultaneously and release the full item quantity in each blanket order without verifying the release quantity and date or specifying a sales order number. To do so, select Release Full Quantity from the Row menu on the Work With Order Blanket Release form. The system generates a sales order for the full quantity and assigns a sales order number through the Next Number Revisions program (P0002).
If you are using the Customer Self-Service version of the P420111 program, you can partially release quantities from multiple blanket orders and from multiple lines on blanket orders if you have set the appropriate processing options. When the system creates the sales orders, you can review each sales order number that results. You can also cancel a single line that has been released, as opposed to having to cancel all of the lines that have been released.
To create a sales order from a blanket order, you must use the unit of measure from the original blanket order. If the units of measure in the sales order do not match the units of measure in the blanket order, the system does not initiate blanket order release.