The SAP SCM system manages batches of material at the plant, material, and client levels. For example, if a company produces a chemical, that product can be assigned a batch number based on the level configured in the system. That batch information can be maintained at the level chosen based on business requirements.

At the plant level, the batch number is unique in connection with the plant and material, allowing businesses to identify which plant produced the material. If batches are maintained at the plant level, the batch information is stored in table MCHA (Figure 1).

Figure 1

Table MCHA, where information on batches maintained at the plant level is stored

At the material level, the batch number is unique to the material. At this level, a batch number has the same meaning for that particular material in all plants, and cannot have different specifications in different plants. If the batch is maintained at the material level, the batch information is stored in table MCH1 (Figure 2).

Figure 2

Table MCH1, where information on batches maintained at the material or client levels is stored

At the client level, the batch number is unique to the client. Batch number uniqueness is maintained in the whole SAP instance – that is, a batch number can be assigned only once per client. You cannot assign the same batch number for different materials. This is a higher level and once you set this level you cannot go back to the lowest batch level. If the batch is maintained at the client level, the batch information is also stored in table MCH1 (Figure 2).

Change Considerations

Because business needs change, companies sometimes need to change business processes and move to a higher level of batch management. For example, if a business requires its characteristic values to be unique across all plants, it opts for a higher level of batch management. An SAP system provides a standard program, RM07CHDX, for batch-level conversion. SAP Note 891902 also has a few prerequisites that are taken into account when converting the batch level from plant to material. To change the batch level from plant level to material level, the material has to be subject to batch management in all plants.

Stock

If the batch-managed material is in stock, the conversion becomes more challenging. If the stock of a particular material is not batch managed across all plants, then that stock must be removed from the system. Table 1 provides an example of a pre-conversion storage scenario.

Table 1

Stock of material 231 is maintained at two plants but not batch managed for plant 0002

In the scenario in Table 1, you have to remove the stock of material 231 from plant 0002 from the system prior to the conversion. After the conversion is completed, upload the stock with the batch in that plant.

If stocks are inventory managed, ensure the entire inventory is managed in batches. If stocks are warehouse managed, ensure all the quants (stock of any material with the same features in one storage bin) are managed in batches. This is a prerequisite for the standard conversion program.

To identify the materials that are not batch managed, complete the following steps.

Step 1. Make a query in transaction code SQVI by joining the MARA and MARC tables in SAP (Table 2).

Table 2

Transaction code SQVI query steps/process in the SAP SCM system

Enter transaction code SQVI. Enter the name MARA_MARC and click the Create button (Figure 3).

Figure 3

Transaction code SQVI query creation joining the MARA and MARC tables

In the pop-up window that appears, type MARA_MARC in the QuickView field of the popup window and select Table join in the Data source drop-down menu (Figure 4).

Figure 4

Provide a description of the MARA_MARC query

Enter the description of the MARA_MARC query in the Title field and press Enter. This takes you to the screen shown in Figure 5. Add the MARA and MARC tables. Click Insert table. Enter MARA in the popup window that opens.  Click Insert table again, and enter MARC in the popup window. This displays both tables. Click the Execute button (not shown) or press the F8 key. This takes you to Figure 6.

Figure 5

The MARA and MARC tables after joining

In Figure 6, click tables MARA and MARC to drop down the input and output fields. This opens up the Available fields list (Figure 7). From the Available fields list, select the fields required for the query. Click the Execute button. This takes you to Figure 8.

Figure 6

Click tables MARA and MARC to drop down the input and output fields

Figure 7

Select the Input and Output fields required for the query

Step 2. Input your selection and execute the query (Figure 8). Execute transaction code SQVI. Input the material type that you need to identify – for example, FERT or ROH. Click the execute icon (identified in Figure 8 by the red box) to run the query and execute the report.

Figure 8

Input screen for query MARA_MARC

This provides the output of the material or plant that does not have batch management activated. Activate batch management for the missing plants and material combination (Table 3).

Table 3

Query output indicating that batch management is not activated for material 231 in plant PC01

Batches

If batches of a material exist across plants, the duplicate batches need to be archived so that the standard program can map each entry from table MCHA to a unique record in table MCH1. Otherwise, the conversion program does not know which plant information is to be converted from table MCHA to table MCH1.

The Batch management check box in the purchasing view of the material master needs to be activated in all the plants for the materials that have existing batches. To view the Batch management check box, execute transaction code MM02 > Select View > Purchasing.

If there are any open documents in the SAP system, you are not able to activate the Batch management check box in the material master. Close all the open documents (i.e., purchase orders, sales orders, delivery notes, and warehouse transfer orders), to activate the Batch management check box.

Case Study

In a recent conversion design for a client, all the materials in all the plants were subject to batch management. This proved to be a relief to the conversion team (a technical consultant, a business analyst, and me), as we didn’t have to deal with the loading or unloading of stocks and closing open documents in the system. However, there were some inconsistencies in the master data management. For example, we observed that the Batch management check box was not active for a few material masters. To solve this, we activated the Batch management check box using Legacy System Migration Workbench (LSMW) script, as all the inconsistent materials were unused.

The client’s batches numbered in the millions, so archiving a select few and leaving a single batch master record per material or batch seemed a tough task. Instead of archiving, we used the oldest batch for conversion. If one material existed in multiple plants with the same batch number, we considered the oldest batch to be a good batch and selected those values to convert in table MCH1 (Table 4).

Table 4

Batches with the earliest creation date used for conversion in table MCH1

The standard SAP program RM07CHDX needs either serial number 1 or 2 to be archived from the MCHA table (Figure 9). The number depends on which plant you need to keep as a reference plant.

Figure 9

The flow diagram of the standard SAP system

 

In cooperation with the business team, we decided that the batch master record with the earliest creation date should be picked in case multiple batches existed for the material in different plants. We then adapted the standard program to pick the batch with the earliest creation date (Figure 10). This would save the tedious job of archiving a select few.

Figure 10

The high-level design of the customized program YRM07CHDX

For the conversion, the Batch management check box had to be activated for all materials in the plants. The configuration was changed to material level in transaction code OMCT.

We ran the conversion program YRM07CHDX. The client had about seven million records converted from MCHA to MCH1 and about 25 million change documents reorganized. The conversion took seven hours to complete.

The new batch master creation is now stored in table MCH1 instead of table MCHA. We performed a Goods Receipt/Goods Issue and checked that materials posted properly.

Post-Conversion Validation

Table MARA stores client and material-level data. If the batch is maintained at the material level, the Batch management check box is activated at the table MARA level. To validate the conversion, go to transaction code MM02, enter any material, use the drop-down menu to select the plant, and go to the purchasing view (Figure 11).

Figure 11

Batch management indicator in the material master

Before conversion, the batch management check box is activated at the MARC level for batches maintained at the plant level, and the technical details in the batch indicator in the purchasing view of the material master displays as MARC-XCHPF. After conversion, the Batch management check box activates at the MARA level for batches maintained at the material level, and the technical details in the batch indicator in the purchasing view of the material master display as MARA-XCHPF.

The batch class type in the system is 022 at the plant level and 023 at the material level. For post-conversion validation, the Batch management indicator in the material master pointed toward table MARA instead of table MARC. After the conversion, the batch class type changed from 022 to 023. You can see this batch type change in Batch master. Select one material or batch from table MCHA. Go to transaction code SE16, input table MCHA, and click the execute icon. Select any material master, Batch master (MM/Batch). Then go to transaction code MSC3N, the batch master display transaction. Input the MM/Batch that you selected from table MCHA. This batch displays as batch class type 023. Before the conversion, it displayed as 022.

The batch level cannot be changed back from a higher level to plant level in the standard SAP SCM system. However, the batch level can be changed from the client level back to the material level. Therefore, businesses must do a thorough analysis before choosing a batch level. The initial decision about the level on which to operate business processes plays a major role in effectively managing batches in an SAP SCM system.

Sakthi Kumar

Sakthi Kumar is a mechanical engineer and an SAP MM/WM senior consultant with Infosys, Ltd. He has more than 13 years of experience, with five years of domain experience and eight years of experience with a variety of SAP implementations, rollouts, and support projects in the automotive, seed, hi-tech, and process industries. His key role is to analyze clients’ business processes and map them to an SAP system to enable the smooth running of business transactions. Contact him at shakthikumark@gmail.com.

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