Use Availability to Manage Order Lines

View availability details on order lines before or after you submit the sales order. Use this feature to view the order lines' expected ship date, arrival date, and delay so you can decide whether to take further action and resolve the delay, such as changing the item, quantity, or other attributes.

Check Availability

Use Check Availability to reschedule the fulfillment line. Use it to view the scheduling options that are available, see the best option, and get the details that you need to evaluate each option:

If Order Management already scheduled the order line, and if your selection changes the Scheduled Ship Date, then Order Management processes the change.
To source from a different warehouse, remove the value from the Warehouse attribute, then click Check Availability. Order Management will recommend a warehouse according to sourcing rules and warehouse rankings.
Your order administrator does the set up that determines the best option and ranks the warehouses. For details, ask your order administrator.

Check availability on the order header or order line before you submit the sales order. Click an action in the Order Management work area, then use a page where you can review and finalize availability options from Global Order Promising. Use it to improve your efficiency:

Check availability, and schedule one or more order lines while you work on one or more sales orders all at the same time.
You can also apply changes when you check availability for a single sales order.

Try it:

Set up your sourcing rules in Global Order Promising. For details, see Source Your Supply Chain.
Go to the Order Management work area, then click Tasks > Sales Orders (New).
Search for, then open your sales order for editing.

Immediately above the order line, click Customize Columns, then display these attributes:

Expected Ship Date
Expected Arrival Date
Delay

Warehouse

Select an order line, click Expected Availability, then look at the results. The Delay attribute will display one of these values:

Value	Description
On Time	If the request is for: Ship On. The Expected Ship Date happens on or before the Requested Date. Arrive On. The Expected Arrival Date happens on or before the Requested Date.
On Time Split	Same as On Time, except Promising split the line into more than one shipment so it could meet the requested date.
Delayed	If the request is for: Ship On. The Expected Ship Date happens after the Requested Date. Arrive On. The Expected Arrival Date happens after the Requested Date.
Delayed Split	Same as Delayed, except Promising split the line into more than one shipment so it could meet the requested date as close as possible.
Error	If you haven't set up your sourcing rules, you might see an error like: Sourcing for item AS54888 isn't set up correctly. Check your item setup, assign your sourcing rule, and refresh the Order Promising server. If you see this error, go to the Order Promising work area and do the set up.

Schedule Order Lines Before You Submit

Continuing our example, notice that the Scheduled Ship Date and Scheduled Arrival Date are empty. Select an order line, then click More Actions > Check Availability.
Use the Check Availability page to get availability details and to see whether supply is available for an order line before you submit the sales order. Assume that the Availability Status in this example is On Time.
Click Edit Line Settings, and then modify attributes that might improve availability. Change the value of an attribute or clear it. For example, change the Requested Ship From Warehouse. You can also click View Availability Options to explore other options.

For example, consider how using a different shipping location will affect fulfillment. You can see the days of delay, cost, and expected arrival for each option.

On the Check Availability page, click Scheduleon the header to schedule all lines, or click More Actions > Schedule Selected and Close to schedule only the lines that you selected, and then notice that the Scheduled Ship Date and Scheduled Arrival Date now have dates on the Order page.

Order Management updated them according to the changes that you made on the Check Availability page.

Unschedule Order Lines Before You Submit

You can unschedule an order line before you submit the sales order. Notice that the Scheduled Ship Date and Scheduled Arrival Date each have a value. Click Actions > Unschedule, then notice that those dates are gone.

Reschedule Lines After You Submit

Search for and open a sales order that you already submitted.
Assume you see that the order line's status is Not Started. Select the order line, then click More Actions > Check Availability.
On the Check Availability page, select your order line, then modify an attribute.
Notice that the Revised attribute contains an icon, then click Schedule.
On the Order page, notice that the Line Status attribute now contains Scheduled.
Get the latest status so you can accurately provide the expected ship and arrival dates when you reply to customer queries about where's my order. Modify the order's attributes to help meet the requested dates. Explore and apply alternative fulfillment options.

Check Availability on the Sales Order Lines Page

Select order lines on the Sales Order Lines page, then click More Actions > Check Availability.
Notice how the page displays a process ID on the banner at the bottom of the page. You can use the process ID to monitor the status of your schedule action and also to get details about lines that aren't eligible to schedule.
Copy the ID, such as 300100651758541, to your clipboard, click Action Status, search for the process ID, then examine the status, such as Completed. If a request fails, the page displays a message that you can use to fix the failure and redo the action.
Click the process ID to get details.
Edit your lines, then click Schedule to schedule them.

Apply Changes While You Check Availability

As an alternative, you can apply your changes on the Check Availability page. Edit your lines, then click Apply.

Order Management will apply your changes to the sales order.

Adjust Attributes That Affect Availability Status

If there's a delay, and if your customer can't accept that delay or if Order Management can't fulfill the order line, then adjust one or more of these attributes:

Attribute	Value to Set
Request Type	Arrive On
Requested Date	Set to a later date.
Shipping Method	Set to a faster method. For example, change it from standard ground shipping to overnight priority shipping.
Ship Lines Together	No For details, see Ship Order Lines in Shipment Sets.
Latest Acceptable Date	Set to a later date.
Allow Partial Shipments of Lines	Yes For details, see Specify Shipping Details for Sales Orders.
Shipment Priority	Yes For details, see Specify Shipping Details for Sales Orders.
Warehouse	Set to a warehouse that's physically closer to the ship-to address, or who maintains a superior fulfillment performance.
Supplier	Set to a supplier who maintains a superior fulfillment performance.
Supplier Site	Set to a supplier site that's physically closer to the ship-to address.
Demand Class	Set to a higher priority.
Allow Item Substitution	Yes
Ship-to Address	Set to an address that's physically closer to the warehouse or the supplier. Make sure your customer can accept the new ship-to address.
Shipment Set	Leave empty.

Example

Assume you discover the transit time is long for some reason. You can set Request Type to Ship On to reduce or remove the delay:

Value	Description
Ship On	Use the date when order fulfillment expects to ship the order line from the fulfillment source, such as the warehouse or a supplier.
Arrive On	Use the date when order fulfillment expects the carrier to deliver the order line to the ship-to address.

The Request Type attribute affects how Order Management calculates availability status. Order Management will attempt to reduce or remove the delay according to the value you select.

Another Example

Set the Ship Lines Together option to one of these values:

Yes. Calculate availability status according to the order line that causes the longest delay. Use this setting when your customer must receive order lines in one shipment.
No. Calculate availability status differently for each order line. Use this setting when your customer can accept receiving order lines in more than one shipment. It might reduce delay for some lines.

Guidelines

You can:

Check availability from the Order page or the Sales Order Lines page.
Check availability and schedule across sales orders.
Check availability on order lines that are in Draft status or Processing status. The Check Availability page won't display an order line that isn't in Draft or Processing status.
You can click More Actions > View Availability Details on the Check Availability page to get details about the line, such as pegging type and set.

Note

You must set up your sourcing rules. See Set Up Promising Rules and Sourcing Rules for Order Management.
Order Management calculates the priority for scheduling according to the requested ship date or the arrival date when you use the Check Availability page.
You can't select a line that isn't shippable, such as a coverage item.
You can't separate a shipment set on the Check Availability page.

For more, see Redwood: Check Availability and Redwood: View Availability Details in Order Management.