SAP ME 6.1: Transferring direct labor records to ECC

[former_member182330]

With this article I'd like to start a series of blog posts that will describe changes and new features that have been introduced in SAP ME 6.1. This will let me dig deeper into the topic myself as well as share details of SAP ME functionality with all of you guys. I consider such articles pretty valuable as SAP ME 6.1 has gotten out of ramp up phase and is generally available to all SAP customers and prospects.

I'd like to start with talking about transferring direct labor records that are sent from SAP ME to ECC as Activity Confirmation of Production Order. We had multiple customers that were requesting this feature and eager to use it. Finally it's here and SAP product management hopes they did a good job. One more thing I'd like to point out - this functionality was also ported to ME 6.0.4. Thus if someone is using this version, the article might also be interesting for them. 

First thing that needs to be said is that ME reports only direct labor records.It means that only labor reported is the labor that is done against a product. So if users log time against some LUNCHBREAK labor charge code or some other activity that is not related to working on manufacturing a product, such labor will not be transferred to ECC. Thus to report time user must actually start/complete/nonconform/signoff SFC.

I'd like to mention that before starting setting up confirmations one needs to set up labor tracking in ME(i.e. enable Labor Tracking in System Rules, create shifts, cost centers, assign supervisors etc) and run SAPMEINT CTC wizard.

To start with setting up labor confirmations first thing to do is to configure standard times for operation processing. Standard time is configured in ME as a replica of master data setup in ECC using Standard Value Key and Scheduling Standards Maintenance. Therefore create Standard Value Key that should contain activity labels relevant for specific routing step (or routing step type). The activities are used later on for collecting distributed times on Labor Off. These activities are present in ECC and should be transferred to ME manually. There is no integration for this yet:

Also define standard KPIs for routing/operation/material or their mix in Scheduling Standards Maintenance:

Second step is to setup POD correctly and add Labor On/Labor Off activities to Start/Complete buttons or as separate buttons. If multiple operators work on the same product at the same time there should be separate buttons for additional operator to be able to labor on to work on SFCs that were initially started by another user. After having this set up user will be prompted to input actual time spent on each of the activities at Labor Off:

..and this information will be transferred to ECC after it is rolled up and approved by user's supervisor in Supervisor Time Edit and Approval activity.

Let me know if the post was useful and notify me if you think any corrections or additions are necessary.

Regards,

Konstantin