Hello SAP experts!

I was discovering some new functionalities these days in S/4 Hana 1809, so in this post you’ll learn a litlle things about Product Allocation Functionality.

Product Allocation can be used to limit or control stock for a variety of characteristics inside the sales order.

Example:

Just for example, we can create a Product Allocation Object to limit the sales of a product per region. In this case, we will use the material number and region of the customer and stipulate limited quantities per month.

Why would companies do this?

To guarantee the distribution of the products all over the country, generally companies that have a limited productive capacity.

So, let’s do this!

First Step, Customizing Check

Sales and Distribution

Basic Functions

Availability Check and Transfer of Requirements

Availability Check

Availability Check with ATP Logic or Against Planning

Define Availability Check Group

Sales and Distribution

Basic Functions

Availability Check and Transfer of Requirements

Transfer of Requirements

Availability Check

Availability Check Against Product Allocation

Maintain Procedure

Sales and Distribution

Basic Functions

Availability Check and Transfer of Requirements

Transfer of Requirements

Availability Check

Availability Check Against Product Allocation

Define Object

Second Step, Configure Product Allocation App

You will notice it, from this step on, we will use only Fiori Apps.

Here we enter, what is the period, the check date time, unit, along with other informations.

We choose in this app, which are the characteristic we will use.
In this example, we’ll use the Sold-to and Material Number.

IMPORTANT: SAP recomends that we create all the partner functions before create the first Product Allocation Object. If we create a product allocation object before create a partner function, the new partner function will not work in product allocation.
If this happen, we need to open an OSS Ticket. This will be fixed in S/4 Hana 1909 release with a new app to manage characteristics.

UPDATE: This issue was fixed on SAP Note 2846131 – Automatic calculation of partner function-related characteristics not working

Third Step, Manage Product Allocation Data App

In this app, we’ll stipulate quantities for the periods and characteristics. One of the fuctionalities is to download a Excel template from the app, then you(or even the final user) can fill the spreadsheet with the characteristics and quantities and upload it.

Constraint Status is a important field. In this case we are not limiting the availability, so it’ll work only for our control.

Fourth Step, Manage Product Allocation Sequences App

In this app we can create a Sequence for our Product Allocation objects.

For this single example, we only create a sequence using only one PAL object, but we can use more depending on the industry requirements.

Fiveth step, Assign Product to Product Allocation App

Finally, it’s time to assign the products(using plant also) to the sequence we created.

After that, we can create Sales Orders for this combinations.

As a final step, explore Product Allocation Overview App!

This app has impressed the users, if the user already knew this functionality on ECC, can impress even more.

The goal here is to comprehend how this functionality can be implemented in our industries.

• Control stock using sales person and material as a characteristic, just to set a goal to the sales person in units of the material.
• Limit material using customer region and material as characteristics, in order to implement a better distribution of the goods per region.
• Control stock using sales office and the division as characteristics
• Limit stock using fields created on Custom Fields and Logic app, in this case, you can achieve what business demands, creating new fields on sales order.

That’s it! I am implementing this functionality, so, any news or features I’ll update this post! Any questions or thoughts please comment!

Useful links

SAP Tech Tips: Advanced Available-to-Promise (aATP) in S/4HANA 1610 Configuration (Part 1)

Advanced Available-to-Promise (aATP) in S/4HANA 1610 Execution (Part 2)

SAP Help aATP PAL

Useful SAP Notes

2642047 – Restriction Note for advanced Available-to-Promise (aATP) in SAP S/4HANA 1809

2691783 – FAQ Product Allocation Check (PAL) with aATP

2505202 – Combination of Settings for aATP and PAL

2496212 – Debugging Aid for Advanced ATP

2752416 – Product Allocation is not executed