Understanding Order Activity Rules

For each item or service that you enter on a purchase order, you must enter a line of detail information that describes the order, including the quantity and cost of the item or service. You must set up order activity rules to establish the sequence of steps through which you process each detail line, for example:

1. Enter order

2. Approve order

3. Print order

4. Receive order

You can set up multiple sets of activity rules. You must assign each set of rules to a certain order type (purchase order, requisition, and so on) and line type. For example, you can specify that a set of activity rules apply only to purchase order detail lines that have a line type of S (stock items).

To save time, you can copy an existing order activity rule by accessing a current combination of an order type and a line type and making the necessary changes.

You must assign status codes to each step in activity rules. Status codes identify the current status of a detail line and the next status to which to advance the line. You must define status codes in ascending numerical order. For example, you can set up status codes for stock line types for purchase orders in the following way:

Last	Next	Description
220	230	Enter Order
230	280	Approval Process
280	400	Print Purchase Order
400	999	Receive Order

You can change the progression of steps by indicating alternate next status codes. For example, using the preceding activity rules, you can bypass the Print Purchase Order step for orders that you send electronically. To do this, you must assign an alternate next status code (400) to the Approval Process step. You can then assign the alternate code to detail lines in the approval process.

You can specify that the system write a record to the F43199 table when a detail line enters a certain step in the activity rules.

You cannot delete an order activity rule if records are in the system for which the status matches any of the statuses that are assigned to the order activity rule.