Design Detail: Order Planning

Planning System versus Order Tracking and Action Messaging

The following comparison shows the differences between the methods that are used by the planning system to create planning line suggestions and the methods that are used by the order tracking system to create order tracking records and action messages.

  • The planning system deals with the entire supply and demand pattern of a particular item, whereas order tracking deals with the order that activated it.
  • The planning system deals with all levels of the BOM hierarchy, whereas order tracking deals with one BOM level at a time.
  • The planning system establishes links between demand and supply according to the prioritized due date. Order tracking establishes links between demand and supply according to the order entry sequence.
  • The planning system takes planning parameters into account, whereas order tracking does not.
  • The planning system creates links in a user-activated batch mode when it balances demand and supply, whereas order tracking creates the links automatically and dynamically as the user enters orders.

Microsoft docs

IEM implementation

IEM follows the standard functionality in Business Central for material planning in Projects and no longer uses the “Project Specific flag” in the entries.
The planning system of Business Central recognizes Project Planning Lines as demand and as such the planning system will show action messages based on these Project Planning Lines. Also the order tracking system will calculate material demand for Projects. In both systems Business Central will create reservation entries of the type Tracking so the planning system can update these entries as required.

However, in the to order style of manufacturing demand is infrequent and cannot rely on history based inventory parameters. For that reason it is important that supply orders are actually reserved for the Project Planning Lines and not just tracked. IEM will therefor create a supply order with a reservation entry of the type Reservation with the Binding option set to Order-to-Order.

Microsoft docs writes the following about Order-to-Order links:
Order-to-order procurement means that an item is purchased, assembled, or produced to exclusively cover a specific demand. Typically, it relates to A-items and the motivation for choosing this policy can be that the demand is infrequent, the lead-time is insignificant, or the required attributes vary. Order-to-order links are applied between demand and supply in four ways:

  • When the planned item uses the reordering policy Order.
  • When using the manufacturing policy Make-to-Order to create multi-level or project-type production orders (producing needed components on the same production order).
  • When creating production orders for sales orders with the Sales Order Planning feature.
  • When assembling an item to a sales order. (Assembly Policy is set to Assemble-to-Order).

In these instances, the planning system will only suggest ordering the required quantity. Once created, the purchase, production, or assembly order will continue to match the corresponding demand. For example, if a sales order is changed in time or quantity, the planning system will suggest that the corresponding supply order is changed accordingly. When order-to-order links exist, the planning system does not involve linked supply or inventory in the balancing procedure. It is up to the user to evaluate if the linked supply should be used to cover other or new demand and, in that case, delete the supply order or reserve the linked supply manually. Reservations and order tracking links will break if a situation becomes impossible, such as moving the demand to a date earlier than the supply. However, the order-to-order link adapts to any changes in the respective demand or supply and thereby the link is never broken.

See Also

Welcome to Industrial Equipment Manufacturing