Please Wait a Moment
X

Infor LX Tips, Infor LN Tips, BPCS Tips, Baan Tips, Infor M3 Tips & Infor ERP News

Crossroads Connections

Infor ERP Tips & News from the Experts

Infor LX | Infor LN | BPCS | Baan | Infor M3

Baan/LN Tip of the Week: The Product Configurator

Kathy Barthelt 0 95183 Article rating: No rating

What is it?
The configurator consists of a set of features (questions). The options (answers) to these questions are used to generate the custom bill of material and routing. These questions may be answered at the time of order entry, prior to order entry (in a project or quote) or after order entry (in the project). The order of the questions do not need to have any relationship to the bill of materials. The configurator may also calculate the selling price, create a unique “smart” item number, custom description and text. Simple rules are used to interpret the answers.

Who uses the configurator?
Companies whose products have options. The configurator eliminates the need for part numbers for all combinations of options. The configurator ensures that the pricing and bills are correct. The configurator also keeps statistics on the frequency the options are selected.

BPCS/LX Tip of the Week: Understanding What Goes On – Out on the Factory Floor

Anthony Etzel 0 17146 Article rating: No rating

Ok… so you want to know the status of a specific shop order that was released two days ago.

What do you do?

It’s a sure bet that you have a manager, supervisor, or planner who can walk the floor and find the order at whatever work center it happens to be at. He/she can then answer “what operations have been completed and how many were completed?” All this requires leg work, and of course, a fair amount of time.

Now, if you have set up your BPCS master files properly, and you report transaction activity, you should be able to get those shop order statuses much faster using the SFC300 Shop Order Inquiry Screen.

At your fingertips you can see:

  • Release date & due date
  • How many hours remain in total and at each operation
  • The quantity required, what was finished, and the remaining quantity
  • What components (materials) have been issued

Pretty basic information, right? Are you getting what you need to know? If not, then you may want to reexamine how your BPCS files are set up and what transactions along with their frequency are captured.

PDIC selects NextTrack Dashboard for Costa Rica Wire Plant

Anthony Etzel 0 54309 Article rating: No rating

The Analytics Dashboard will be used in combination with the existing Crossroads MES system to provide real time machine status across the plant. In addition, KPI’s like OEE and Downtime % will be monitored and displayed at the wire machines and to the production management.

BPCS/LX Tip of the Week: Changing the Master Schedule

Anthony Etzel 0 73522 Article rating: 4.5

You can change your master schedule by specifying the type of master schedule update to perform. You can run a Net Change or Regenerative Schedule.

You also have the ability to clear the lower level requirements out of the Planned and Firm-Planned Order file.

Baan/LN Tip of the Week: Optionally Include Tax Amounts In Order Balance

Kathy Barthelt 0 107232 Article rating: No rating

In Baan IV, the order balance amount always includes the tax amount. Consequently, the tax amount must be recalculated every time an order line is modified in order to update the balance correctly. If the tax provider is activated, this requires an API call for every re-calculation of tax.

In Infor LN, users can select or clear the new Include Tax in Order Balance check box in the COM Parameters (tccom0000s000) session to indicate whether users want to include tax amounts in the order balance amount. This parameter has an effect on various sessions in Order Management.

Baan/LN Tip of the Week: Default Order Frequency

Kathy Barthelt 0 114568 Article rating: No rating

In Baan IV, requirements for an MPS item with the order method lot-for-lot result in daily planned MPS orders.

For example, if a plan period contains 10 working days and the net requirements for an item in that period is 2000 pieces, an MPS planning run generates one planned MPS order of 200 pieces for each working day in the plan period.

In Infor LN, requirements for a planned item with the order method lot-for-lot result in one planned order per plan period.

For example, if a plan period contains 10 working days and the net requirements for an item in that period is 2000 pieces, a master planning run will generate a single planned order of 2000 pieces for the first working day in that plan period. To influence the order quantity of the planned orders, enter appropriate values in the Maximum Order Quantity field and the Order Interval field in the Items – Ordering (tcibd2500m000) session or choose a fixed order quantity.

BPCS/LX Tip of the Week: What is Lean Make to Order?

Anthony Etzel 0 71019 Article rating: No rating

This is a simple way to go from the customer order to making the order and shipping the order. It involves a few simple steps:

  1. Receive and enter the customer order
  2. Automatic credit review
  3. Automatic release of the shop order tied to the customer order
  4. Issue material, report labor to the production order receipt
  5. Pick the order, ship the order, invoice the customer

With lean, you can skip processing the demand through MRP. You can go directly from the customer order to the shop order creation.

PDIC Goes Live with Crossroads MES

Anthony Etzel 0 52567 Article rating: 5.0

PDIC, a leading producer of wire products, went live with the Crossroads MES solution on June 30th,2014. PDIC needed a better way to deploy and report shop floor information to BPCS 6.02. Their goal was to eliminate all their manual reporting and position themselves to take advantage of the Crossroads Dashboards.

First120121122123124125126128

Tips:  LX | BPCS | M3

Improves control over PO costing changes during invoice entry by replacing passive warnings with an intentional override action.

  • In ACP500D3 (Invoice Entry PO Costing), users previously could unintentionally accept changes by pressing ENTER, even when quantity to cost or amount to cost values had changed.

  • A new “F14 to Override” warning message replaces the old message:
    “Details have changed. Press enter again to accept data.”
    This ensures users acknowledge and confirm significant changes explicitly.

New System Parameter:

  • “Apply GRN Costing Tolerance for PO Costing” (optional):

    • Within tolerance: Displays the original message —
      “Details have changed. Press enter again to accept data.”

    • Outside tolerance: Triggers the new override requirement —
      “F14 to Override”

Benefits:

  • Enhances oversight and reduces unintentional cost acceptance.

  • Enables better control of PO costs when invoice details differ from expectations.

Last

Tips: LN | Baan

An ERP System Review is NOT a Report Card

It's a no-judgment-review - we promise!

report card C minusWe all remember our school days and the nervousness that we felt when it came time to get our grades. Even if we were doing well, we were still nervous. Sometimes we experienced that same nervousness when it came time for a performance review on our job. Nervousness…sometimes dread…knowing that our performance was not what we wanted it to be, or others expected it to be. 

Somehow I think the feelings that we felt in our past often find ways to creep into our present. I have seen this recently when I suggested an ERP system review to one of our customers. They immediately became flustered and thought about every possible problem that they knew existed within the software and how they were currently using it. I asked them to consider the purpose of the ERP system review.

An ERP Utilization Review will:

  • Document how your company is using your ERP system (or a particular aspect of the system) and to what extent the system meets the needs of the business.
  • Identify challenges encountered using the software.
  • Create opportunities for improving business processes and generating additional value.
  • Identify potential risks and areas that need improvement.


key hole to the futureSo, if the result of ERP system review is to establish a path forward for growth based on current status, then why doesn’t every company take advantage of it? I think for some, the answer lies in the feelings of nervousness and dread still stuck in the recesses of our brains.

An ERP system review or more specifically a utilization review is NOT a personal report card, or performance review showing how well a particular individual does his/hers/their job, nor is it an attack on the team that implemented the software. 

As they say, hindsight is 20/20. What we view now to be a less than ideal implementation methodology may have been absolutely appropriate at the time the software was originally deployed. The software has likely matured and the skillsets of the individuals responsible for the system have likely matured as well. In some cases, those resources are no longer with the company, leaving those that remain with no back story as to how and why implementation decisions were made.

Instead of viewing the ERP utilization review as a reason to find fault in previous decisions, think of it as discovering untapped potential – both of the ERP system and the people who use it. Viewing an ERP utilization review in this way puts a positive spin on it and allows us to challenge ourselves to identify opportunities for growth far greater than anything we imagined before. This means not only moving our businesses forward faster but also advancing the strength of the company as individuals and as a team.

What untapped potential lies within your company?

Consider a utilization review of your entire ERP system, or just a part of it like Finance, Technology, Materials Management, Order Processing, or Shop Floor Control. You just might be surprised at what greatness can be achieved… far greater than anyone could have imagined.  

Get a free phone consultation button

800.762.2077

Print
28385 Rate this article:
5.0
Kathy Barthelt

Kathy BartheltKathy Barthelt

Other posts by Kathy Barthelt

Contact author

x

Categories