Service Management in SAP with Customer Service Module(CS)

In this blog post, I would like to share my views on Service Management in SAP with Customer Service Module which is completely different from the CRM-Service Management/Customer Management.

The term Service Management is little bit tricky in SAP, as there are lot of similarities between Plant Maintenance and Service Management in SAP. The reason for this is both SM and PM shares same configuration nodes, Master data and Transactions with some difference. I would like to discuss about the service management which is integrated with Sales and Distribution Module. The Customer Service Module is a sub-branch of SD module for service management which is tightly integrated with various modules like SD/MM/PM/FI/CO/HR/QM/PP in SAP.

I had gone through the various blogs on service management from an outbound logistics consultant perspective, but none gives me the overall scope of the customer service module, all blogs give information on returns & repairs with gaps or it is directing me towards PM area. Here I would like to list out all processes in the customer service module.

Customer Service Module with in SAP Core ERP enables to manage a wide range of service scenarios starting from pre-sales, sales and post-sales.

Master Data in CS:

1. Customer Master (Business Partner)
2. Material Master
3. Condition Master (prices, surcharges, Taxes etc.)
4. Equipment Master: Material No. + Serial No. + Warranty
5. Serial Number: Unique number or I.D given to a product
6. Warranty Master
7. Installed Base: Represents customer
8. Functional Location: Represents the location where machine is installed
9. Work Center : Represents Department in the company
10. Cost Center : Represents Technician or Mechanic
11. Activity : Activity represents the work or repair or service which is done by the cost center.
12. Activity Pricing: Activity Pricing is the pricing/cost/charge of the service done by the cost center.

Customer Service Module includes functions for Processing:

1. Service Notifications:

Service Notification is a document created for capturing complaint from the customer.

2. Warranties:

Warranty is a promise given for a product during the sales in terms of usage life which holds guarantee(Repair or Replace a defective product or its parts) .

3. Service orders:

The details of actual service tasks with work center, cost center, activities, technician, inspections, planned duration and components etc. are captured in the service order

4. Service Contracts:

Service contracts are used to record the details of the service package that one have agreed to provide a service recipient with over a specific period of time.( E.g. The routine service tasks which are to be performed on a piece of machinery that has been sold or rented to a customer(Rental contract-MV/Maintenance contract-WV)

• Service Contract with Periodic Billing
• Service with Time and Material based Billing
• Service with Fixed Billing

5. Service quotations:

Service quotations are used to record the terms and conditions under which one offer a particular service to a customer.

6. Repair orders:

Repair orders provides you with a wide range of functions for managing all the necessary activities which repairing goods for a customer entails, from registering the repair request from the customer through to billing the customer for the services performed.

• Repair Process
• Maintenance & Warranty Processing
• Supply Replacement Material

Key Points:

• Resource-related billing is used to bill service activities and costs that are not covered directly by the service fee for the contract.
• Resource-related service quotation is created with reference to service order, Debit memo request and Credit memo requests are created with reference to service order or Sales document i.e e.g. Sales Contract.
• The plan service activities more accurately and to be able to influence costs are forwarded to billing from service order via resource related billing with the help of DIP Profile (Dynamic item processor profile)
• The operations costs or other costs in the service order will be transferred to the SD Sales documents into “EK01” Condition Value.
• Resource-related billing is not always mandatory to be used, need and usage of it depends upon the scenario or requirement from the business.
• Billing plan functionalities are used in SD Contracts.

Elaboration of Various Types of Repair Scenarios under service management in CS: As there are various blogs on repair process with steps, I am not detailing much with the screen shots of the process steps. The below mentioned pictorial diagrams illustrates the process flow.

Note:

Serviceable Material: Represents the goods to be repaired in repairing processing.

Service Product: Material that represents the Customer’s repair request. The service product is represented in the system by a material master record.

Repair Order Types in SAP CS/SD:

Depending on how repairs processing is performed by the business, you can choose between one of the following repair order types in the standard system:

RAS – Repair order with service product:

You use this type of repair order if you want to specify the repairs to be performed at the time of order entry. A repair order of the type RAS is incomplete until a service product is entered. You can:

• Enter the service product directly in the Material field in the repair order

• Use the material determination function to find suitable service products via the material number of the serviceable material.

When you enter the service product and serviceable material in the repair request item, the system creates a return order item automatically for the serviceable material. The repair procedure controls this.

RA – Repair order:

You use this type of repair order if you perform repairs according to the results of the technical check. You do not have to enter a service product at the order entry stage. After the technical check has determined what repairs need to be performed on the serviceable material, you can:

• Enter the appropriate service product on the repair screen of the repair order

• Use the material determination function to find suitable service products via the material number of the serviceable material.

• You must enter a service product in the RA repair order before the service technician can begin the repairs.

Scenario 1 Returns & Repairs: 

• The business process starts with a customer reporting a problem. A service executive creates a service notification in the system.
• The service executive carries out a warranty check based on serial number & material on the service notification and enters customer details.
• The service executive informs the customer about the expected date of repair completion. A repair order is then created from the service notification so that the entire repair process can be controlled and settled. In the repair order, the defective / damaged product is automatically assigned by the returns items
• A service order is automatically generated using an item proposal to enable the repairs to be carried out. Once the repairs have been carried out, the costs are confirmed to the service order.
• The repaired product is delivered to the customer and the final repair status can be displayed.
• The service center creates a billing request. This appears in the repair order as an additional item and is not a separate document (unlike the billing request in the on-site service process). The repair order can now be billed.
• The costs resulting from the service order are settled to the repair order.

Scenario 2 Onsite Repairs: 

• The business process starts with a customer reporting a problem with a Product. A service executive creates a service notification in the system.
• The service executive processes the service notification and sets its status to “in process”. The service executive then calls a technician and assigns him/her to the relevant service order.
• Subsequently, a service order is created from the extended notification, and the activities required and times for the service to be carried out on-site are planned.
• The technician carries out the repairs at the customer’s site and confirms the spare par ts and services used by issuing an overall completion confirmation.
• A billing request is created.
• The service executive checks the service order and technically completes

Scenario 3 External Processing: 

• The business process starts with a customer reporting a problem. A service executive creates a service notification in the system.
• The service executive carries out a warranty check on the service notification and enters customer details.
• The service executive informs the customer about the expected date of repair completion. A repair order is then created from the service notification so that the entire repair process can be controlled and settled. In the repair order, the defective / damaged mobile is automatically assigned by the returns items
• A service order is automatically generated using an item proposal to enable the repairs to be carried out. Once the repairs have been carried out, the costs are confirmed to the service order.
• The services or components are procured externally with purchase order and Goods receipt/Invoice verification is done with reference to P.O
• The repaired mobile is delivered to the customer and the final repair status can be displayed.
• The service center creates a billing request. This appears in the repair order as an additional item and is not a separate document (unlike the billing request in the on-site service process). The repair order can now be billed.
• The costs resulting from the service order are settled to the repair order.

Scenario 4 AMC: 

• The business process starts with a customer requesting to sign a contract. A sales service executive creates a Contract in the system.
• The sales executive enters all the information relevant for creating a contract, save the document for billing purpose.
• Subsequently, sales executive create an Invoice with reference to the contract number.

Hope this will give a clarity and clear picture on the service management in SAP with CS module for SD/OTC consultants. Please feel free to give me with your comments and suggestions to improve this blog post.

Thanks & Regards,

S.Himavanth.