Jobs are only released to production when material is fully allocated to all job components. To prevent late job release, it is important that open POs are monitored to insure that materials are received by their scheduled supply dates.
Master Schedule Dates
The master PO schedule can be viewed in the PO Schedule screen and consists of the following dates:
Due Date
This is the original planned supply date generated by MRP. It is forward scheduled from the current date by the item’s Lead Days allocation, rounded forward if needed to land on a shop day. This date stays fixed and is the basis for evaluating the item’s Lead Days setting and supplier delivery performance.
Expected Date
This date is initially the same as the Due Date. If a PO is running late relative to its Required date and the supplier furnishes you with a firm delivery date, you can enter it as the Expected date to update the master schedule with a realistic supply date.
Required Date
This is the date that the item is needed to supply dependent demand events or to replenish stock. It is established as follows:
•If the earliest dependent demand event is a job, this is the job’s Planned Start date.
•If the earliest dependent demand event is a sales order, this is the SO line item’s Required date.
•When the PO is for stock and there are no dependent demand events, the date is made equal to the last day of the item’s planning period at time of MRP generation.
Status Fields
Two status fields in the PO Schedule screen help you monitor supplier delivery and assess the impact of late POs on dependent demand events.
Days Past Due
A Days Past Due value means that the current date is ‘X’ calendar days past the PO line’s Due Date, which means that the PO is late relative to its planned supply date.
Contact the supplier
When a PO has not been received by its planned Due Date, you can contact the supplier to expedite delivery or receive a firm delivery date.
Update the Expected date
If the supplier furnishes you with a firm delivery date, enter it in the Expected date field to update the master schedule with a realistic supply date.
Days Past Req
A value in this field means that the Expected date or current date, whichever is latest, is ‘X’ calendar days past the PO line’s Required date, which will affect dependent demand events.
Supply Dependencies
The icon in the Dependencies field, which launches the Supply Dependencies inquiry, becomes visible when the PO line is scheduled to be received late relative to dependent demand events. Dependent demand events are jobs or sales orders with demand dates earlier than the Expected date or the current date.
Dependent Jobs
Jobs listed in the Supply Dependencies inquiry will be delayed for release to production if the PO line is not received on time. No action is needed because dependent jobs that are released late will automatically receive greater priority in work center queues and may still be finished by their required dates.
Dependent Sales Orders
Sales order lines listed in the Supply Dependencies inquiry will be late for shipment if the PO line is not received by its Required date. When this is the case, you may wish to inform the customer when shipment is likely to be made.
Never change the SO line Required date
When shipment is likely to be delayed, never change the sales order line Required date, which must be left as is to give the sales order high priority within the Shipment Planner in the Order Picking screen.
Use the SO line Expected Ship date as the customer communication date
The Sales > Late Supply screen will help you update the Expected Ship date for items that are running behind schedule
What causes late dependencies?
Late dependencies associated with POs occur for the following reasons:
Late PO
A late PO line creates a late dependency when its Days Past Due is sufficient to cause the current date or Expected date to be past the Required date.
Manual PO
A manually created PO can cause a late dependency because it lacks the proper date alignment that occurs when POs are generated through MRP.
Cancel and cease using manual POs
Manual PO creation should be ceased immediately because manual POs are not compatible with the master schedule. All POs should be generated through MRP based on actual demand with proper date alignment. Any blanket POs with multiple future receipt dates should be cancelled. Each affected supplier should be notified that the remaining quantities on each blanket PO are cancelled and will be replaced with individual POs from this point forward. Instead of using a blanket PO, which is a crude form of forecasting, it is much more efficient to use a forecast -derived Reorder Point in combination with a Supply Days setting so that POs get triggered by actual demand.
Manual Job
Late dependencies can be caused by a job created manually without the proper date alignment that occurs when jobs are generated by MRP.
Cease manual job creation
Manual job creation should be ceased immediately because manual jobs are not compatible with the master schedule. All jobs should be generated through MRP based on actual demand with proper date alignment.
Premature Job Release
Late dependencies can be caused by releasing a job prematurely when material is not fully allocated. Never release jobs without allocated material. Doing so disables the self-adjusting nature of the master schedule and distorts material allocation for other jobs.
