Realignments finally available in Account Based CO-PA with S/4HANA 1610

Since the introduction of Simple Finance (now S/4HANA Finance) Account Based CO-PA is the preferred Profitability Analysis method. Costing Based Profitability Analysis is still available and both types can be used in parallel. However all new features will be introduced in Account Based Profitability Analysis and this is the only type which provides complete integration with the General Ledger.

So to make use of all the benefits of S/4HANA and the Universal Journal (ACDOCA), Account Based Profitability Analysis is the way to go. At least, if you don’t have reasons which are keeping you away from this type of Profitability Analysis. In my first Blog “Finance in S/4HANA 1610: The What, Why and How” I had already mentioned some gaps and limitations in Account Based Profitability Analysis. One of these limitations is finally solved in S/4HANA 1610, well at least partially solved because there are still some minor limitations.

One of the things I liked most of Costing Based Profitability Analysis was the possibility of cancelling and reposting CO-PA documents independent from the General Ledger posting. This is at the same time one of the downsides of this type of Profitability Analysis, since there is now alignment with Financial Accounting or the General Ledger. However it gives you a lot of flexibility to add or change characteristics, even to historical data.

Introduction of Realignments in Account Based CO-PA

Account Based Profitability Analysis in S/4HANA gives us the advantage of full integration with the General Ledger. However there was no possibility to change or add characteristics after a posting was completed. The Profitability Characteristics were tightly integrated in the General Ledger posting in the Universal Journal (ACDOCA).

As of S/4HANA 1610, the Realignment functionality comes to Account Based CO-PA. Some of you will already be familiar with Realignment in CO-PA (KEND), since this is an already existing functionality in SAP. I barely used it because I mostly preferred to cancel and repost the CO-PA document to reflect changes instead of Realigning. With Account Based CO-PA, Realignment is your only option to make changes to Characteristics.

Why is the availability of this functionality that important and what are the business requirements? The most important are the following:

• Reflect organizational changes in your product, sales or customer structure in already posted documents.
• Make corrections to inconsistencies or incorrectly assigned characteristics at the time of the original postings.
• Enrich profitability data by information not yet available at the time of posting.

General Facts and limitations

Since there is no separation of Financial Accounting and Management Accounting data anymore in the Universal Journal there are some limitations in changing document.

• Changes to journal entries have to always follow the guidelines of standard accounting principles
• Realignment of Universal Journal can only be processed for non-GL relevant information
• Changeable CO-PA Characteristics are pre-defined by SAP and selection cannot be changed by users

Available Characteristics for realignment

As mentioned the list of Characteristics is pre-defined by SAP. Some characteristics can be changed only when they are initial at the time of realignment. The complete list of Characteristics is provided below.

Characteristics that cannot be changed

The table below contains all Characteristics of the Operating Concern that cannot be changed:

Executing the Realignment

As mentioned, the realignment functionality is not new, it was already available before. The transaction code is not changed and is still KEND. If Costing Based CO-PA is activated, Realignment is processed for both Profitability Analysis methods (Account and Costing Based). This is in order to keep the information in sync.

The realignment characteristics are updated in the Universal Journal (ACDOCA) and in case of Costing Based also in the Segment Tables (CE4xxxx). So there are no new line items generated through the realignment run.

The original information (as posted view) from the Universal Journal is stored in a dedicated table.

You can execute transaction KEND in SAP GUI or do it in Fiori:

The following selection does not make sense, since Realignment will be updated in both types of CO-PA:

I created the following Realignment run:

I would like to change the material group of a specific material. So in the Selection Condition of the run I have selected the material number:

The Material Group in one material in the selected billing document has changed. I just want to update the Material Group. So this is my selection in the Conversion Rules:

This indicator can be set if you want to re-derive Attributed Profitability Segments:

If you are new to Attributed Profitability Segments you can read my blog on this newly released functionality.

The old Material Group was 01 in the initial document. This can be checked in ACDOCA:

Material Group in material changed to 02:

Execute the Realignment run:

The Realignment run is finished successfully:

In ACDOCA you can see that the Material Group in the original Journal entry is changed:

Original “As Posted” values

s you have noticed, after Realignment the Characteristics in the original Journal posting are changed. However the initial Characteristics values are still available for the “as posted view’’ of the document. In case of Account Based CO-PA these values are stored in the dedicated table ACDOCA_KENC. For Costing Based CO-PA these values are stored in table CE4****_KENC.

The original “as posted” values are taken from ACDOCA_KENC:

When a Realignment Run is restored the values in ACDOCA_KENC for that Realignment run are deleted. So there are no additional line items created for the Restore of the Realignment.

Restoring the original values

Since the original values are kept in a dedicated table. It is always possible to restore the Realignment.

After executing the Restore you will see that the status of the Realignment run is changed:

The posting in the Universal Journal (ACDOCA) will be restored to the default Material Group 01:

Availability for S/4HANA Finance

The Realignment functionality for Account Based CO-PA is available in 1610. However you can also activate the functionality if you are on S/4HANA Finance 1605 (SAP_FIN 730). The functionality comes with support package 05 (SAP_FIN 730: SP 0005) or you can enable it by implementing a bunch of OSS notes. The main OSS notes are the following, and these will guide you to all the other relevant notes:

• 2350123 – S/4 HANA Finance: Realignment for account-based profitability data I
• 2344759 – S/4 HANA Finance: Realignment for account-based profitability data II

Final Words

To conclude, I’m very pleased to see the availability of Realignment for Account Based CO-PA. This was one of the major gaps between Account and Costing Based CO-PA preventing customers to completely switch over to Account Based. In daily practice you can’t avoid organizational changes or the fact that attributes are wrongly assigned. Without completely cancelling and reposting Documents it was not possible to reflect these changes in Account Based CO-PA before. This was the major argument for customers to not work with Account Based CO-PA in S/4HANA.

With the release of Realignment for Account Based CO-PA I think we are a step closer to a complete integration of General Ledger and CO-PA. There is just one major gap left in Account Based CO-PA: The support of statistical SD condition not posting to GL.

This blog first appeared on my personal website www.s4hanablog.com