Work Flow Mail Generation for Release Procedure in Sourcing Module

Introduction:

In Sourcing it is regular to have the release process for the POs created by the Buyers. Approvers quiet often need to have the information of the Purchase Orders created for their approvals in a one way mode of communication say through a mail triggered to their Outlook through SAP so that they will have the information that a Purchase Document is on wait for his approval.

SAP has given a way to accomplish this through a process called workflow generation. The created workflow template based upon the release conditions will trigger a mail to the approver.

The Process:

Step 1: Create a Release Procedure

Step 2: Assign release characteristic values to the release to the release strategy Created.

Step 3: Create a workflow with the release conditions.

The process will be explained here for a single stage workflow mail to get triggered to the approver.

Step 1. Create a Release Procedure

Path: SPRO–>Materials Management –>Purchasing –>Purchase Order–>Release Procedure for Purchase Orders–>

Here create a). Characteristics (Transaction Code CT04)

b) CLASS (Transaction Code CL02) Here we need to create a Class , which is the container of the characteristic and assign the Characteristic

C) Define Release Procedure for Purchase Orders

C.1) Define Release Group:

C.2) Define Release Codes: Define a Release code called Z1 for the release Group Z1.

C.3 ) In this step you define the  Release strategy for the Release Group and the Release code Created.

Step 2 :

Either at the CL20N Transaction code at the Classification Button in the above screen assign  the values for the Characteristics Assigned to the class so as to enable the release . Here in this case for the PO value say ‘>50000 USD.

Now the Release Procedure is ready.

With the above process created, now whenever a user creates a PO which is greater than 50 thousand US Dollars, the Release gets triggered to the PO.

Step 3 :

The approver can have a mail notification sent to his mail box through SAP

The below steps explains how this process can be made possible.

Use the Transaction code SWDD–>Create a workflow

In this Transaction code we need to use the standard template for the PO Release as Task TS90100059 (PO_ Release)

Select the Task to be Send Mail

Add a Binding with the Release Group and Strategy with the Release Indicator.

With this Binding we are telling to the system saying that an activity will be started when a PO is with the specified Release Group and Release strategy, system initiates a mail to the approver mail box, which is already indicated in the workflow.

Conclusion:

The process depicted above is a simple mail generation process for a single step approval .This process can be used for multi level approval too .