Questions on Production Planning

Here are more than 100 questions (well… just questions) on Production Planning. Go through it and see as to how many you can answer.

Master Data

Organizational Structures

1. What are the various organizational structures in the R/3 System?
2. Which R/3 organizational structures are used primarily for PP?
3. What is the relation between controlling area, company code, valuation area, plant and storage location

Material Master

1. What is the purpose of different material master views?
2. Which views are available?
3. Which views are used primarily for PP?
4. What is the relationship between material master views and individual organizational structures?
5. How does the industry sector influence the material master maintenance?
6. How does the material type influence the material master maintenance?
7. What is the difference between external and internal number assignment and how is it set up in Customizing?
8. Which other factors can influence the selection of fields in the material master?
9. How can MRP profile and forecast profile be used to optimize material master maintenance?
10. How can a material master be reorganized (deleted/archived)?
11. Which units of measure can affect processing in the material master (base unit of measure, production unit, order unit, etc.)?
12. What is the material status used for and on which levels could it be maintained?
13. Review the usage of the following settings?

• MRP group
• MRP type
• Reorder point
• Planning time fence
• MRP controller
• Lot size
• Procurement type
• Special procurement type
• Production storage location
• Backflush flag
• Stock determination group
• Bulk material
• Scheduling margin key
• Safety stock
• Strategy group
• Consumption mode and consumption period
• Availability checking group
• Alternative selection flag
• Dependent requirement flag for individual and collective requirements
• Production scheduler
• Production scheduling profile
• Underdelivery/overdelivery tolerance
• In-house production time (lot size dependent/independent)
• Valuation class
• Price control indicator
• Moving average price/standard price

Bills of Material

1. What is determined by BOM usage?
2. What technical types of BOM are available?
3. Can the technical type of a BOM be changed?
4. During which processes will BOM usage and status be considered?
5. When would it be useful to make use of a Group BOM?
6. What is meant by area of validity and effectivity of a BOM?
7. Which item categories are available and what are their specifications?
8. What is a sub-item?
9. Under which circumstances could a BOM be recursive and what the usage of the recursive indicator?
10. What is the usage of the following BOM settings?

• Explosion type
• Relevant to production
• Relevant to costing
• Material provision indicator
• Bulk material
• Production storage location

Work Centers

1. What is a work center category?
2. What data can be maintained on the various views (basic, default, capacity, scheduling, costing, etc.)?
3. What is the purpose of a standard value key?
4. What role does the operation control key play?
5. What does referencing mean?
6. Why to use a work center hierarchy?
7. What is a pooled capacity?
8. Analyze the usage of the following fields?

• Backflush indicator
• Capacity category
• Formulas for determining capacity requirements
• Rate of capacity utilization
• Relevant to finite scheduling indicator
• Overload
• Formulas for scheduling
• Location group (move time matrix)
• Queue times (normal and minimum)
• Cost center
• Activity types
• Formulas for costing

Routings

1. What does a routing define?
2. How is a routing structured?
3. What task list types are available in the R/3 System?
4. What is a routing group and group counter?
5. What is a routing sequence, and what types of sequence are available?
6. What could be reasons to use sequences?
7. What are the various options to assign materials to routings?
8. Under which conditions would it make sense to assign components to operations?
9. What is a reference operation set?
10. How could the lotsize-dependend inhouse production time be calculated and updated into the material master?
11. Production Resources/Tools
12. What types of PRT are available?
13. What is the relationship between PRTs and a routing/operation?

Engineering Change Management

1. What are the objectives of Engineering Change Management?
2. What is the significance of changes with a history?
3. Which PP objects can be managed using Engineering Change Management?
4. What is the purpose of an engineering change request/order?
5. How is a change master record structured?
6. What is a revision level compared to engineering change master?

Other Issues

1. Which scheduling options are available, and how do they differ from each other?
2. Which time components are taken into account during scheduling?
3. How are basic order dates determined?
4. How are the scheduled dates determined?
5. Which scheduling types are available in lead time scheduling?
6. What role do reduction measures play in scheduling?
7. What types of scrap can be maintained in PP basic data and how would they be considered during MRP repectively scheduling?
8. What is external processing, and what conditions must be fulfilled before external processing can take place?
9. What are co-products?

Production Planning – General Issues

1. What are the various planning levels available in R/3 PP?
2. What are the dependencies between Sales and Operations Planning, Demand Management, Long-Term-Planning and Material Requirements Planning?

Sales and Operations Planning

1. What is the purpose of Sales and Operations Planning?
2. What is the structure of product groups and how could they be used in SOP/DM/LTP/MRP?
3. What is the purpose of proportion factors and aggregation factors within product groups?
4. Which planning methods are available in SOP?
5. Which sources are available as input data for SOP?
6. Which options are available for creating a sales plan in SOP?
7. Which options are available for creating an operations plan in SOP?
8. What is ‘disaggregation’?
9. How could the result of SOP be passed on to different planning tools within the PP planning environment?

Demand Management

1. What is the purpose of Demand Management?
2. At which points is Demand Management integrated with Sales and Distribution?
3. Explain the main strategies in Make-to-Stock as well as in Make-to-Order planning logic. Pay attention to master data settings.
4. What does consumption respectively reduction mean in the context of planning strategies?
5. What role does the individual/collective requirements indicator in the material master have during make-to-order production?
6. What is a stocking level, and how can it be influenced?
7. Which types of availability check are available (ATP and check against planning) and what are the characteristics of these checks?
8. Explain the link between MRP group, strategy group, strategy and requirement class.
9. What settings could be made in requirements classes (on PP as well as on SD side)?
10. Explain the purpose of version management in Demand Management?

Master Production Scheduling

1. Under which circumstances would you recommend the usage of MPS?
2. Compare the functionality of MPS with MRP?
3. What is meant by the ‘firming’ of procurement proposals, and how can this effect be achieved?
4. What is a planning time fence, and where is it defined?
5. What is a manual firming date, and where is it defined?
6. How can a planned order be ‘firmed’, and which firming indicators are available in a planned order?

Material Requirements Planning

1. What is the purpose of MRP and how does it fit into the PP planning environment?
2. How would you organize MRP runs? Discuss the different options

• MRP for a plant – online
• MRP for a plant – in background
• MRP for a material (individual planning) – online

1. Which planning types are available (NEUPL, NETCH, NETPL)?
2. Which planning parameters are to be set in the application itself?
3. What is the function of the planning file?
4. What is meant by single-level planning, multi-level planning?
5. What is meant by interactive MRP?
6. What are the characteristics of an MRP scenario that is performed in simulation mode?
7. What is meant by low-level code and how is it considered in MRP?
8. What is a net requirements calculation?
9. Which buffers can be taken into account for the net requirements calculation in MRP (quantity buffer: safety stock, time buffer: safety time)?
10. What does lot-size calculation entail?
11. Which lot-sizing procedures are available in the R/3 System (static, periodic and optimizing procedures)? What are the characteristics of these lot-sizing procedures?
12. How does the procurement type defined in the material master affect MRP?
13. What is backward scheduling? What are the characteristics of backward scheduling?
14. What is the difference between basic scheduling and lead time scheduling?
15. How are the order due dates determined in basic scheduling?
16. How are the order due dates determined in lead time scheduling?
17. How does the in-house production time defined in the material master affect scheduling?
18. How does the scheduling margin key affect scheduling?
19. How are BOMs selected in MRP? Which criteria are taken into account during BOM selection?
20. What is a ‘BOM selection ID’?
21. How are alternative BOMs selected?
22. What is a production version?
23. How are routings selected in MRP? Which criteria are taken into account during routing selection?
24. What is an MRP list? What is a stock/requirements list? How are these lists structured? What are the differences between these lists?
25. What is the function of exception messages?
26. What are planned orders?
27. What is meant by the individual/collective conversion of planned orders?
28. What is meant by “days’ supply” and “receipt days’ supply”?
29. How can component discontinuation be managed in MRP?

Production Order Processing – General Issues

1. What are the characteristics of work-to-order production?
2. What is defined in a production order?
3. What is a document type, an order category and an order type?
4. What are the various elements that a production order contains?
5. Which functions are executed when an order is created?
6. What are the various options available for creating an order?
7. Describe the system logic during routing selection?
8. Describe the system logic during BOM selection?
9. At which point in time are reservations generated and what information does it contain?
10. What can be achieved by performing the “Read master data” function?
11. How could routing sequences be considered during production order creation?
12. Describe the conversion of planned orders into production orders with focus on scheduling aspects?

Order Release

1. What happens when an order is released?
2. Which operations are made possible and which are prevented when an order is released?
3. What is meant by status management?
4. What are business transactions?
5. What are the differences between system status and user status?
6. At which points in time can availability checks be performed? Which settings can be made, and which must be made? On which objects can the availability check be run?
7. What is meant by machine commitment?
8. What is meant by midpoint scheduling?
9. Printing
10. Which shop floor papers can be printed?
11. Which print modes are available (online, update, background)?
12. What does “reprinting” mean?
13. Which conditions must be fulfilled before order documents can be printed?
14. Which conditions must an operation fulfill before shop floor papers (and in particular confirmation slips and time tickets) can be printed?

Goods Issue

1. Which control indicators influence the behavior of the components in the production order (bulk material, backflush, phantom assembly, etc.)?
2. What is meant by picking?
3. What is meant by stock determination? Which settings have to be made for stock determination during production order processing?
4. What is a goods issue posting?How can goods issues be entered (reference to order, reference to reservation, unplanned, etc.)?
5. What is the purpose of movement types?
6. What are the effects of a goods issue posting from an integrational point of view (MM, FI, CO)?
7. What is meant by the backflushing of components and how can this be achieved?

Confirmation

1. Which conditions must be fulfilled before confirmations can be entered?
2. What is a confirmation?
3. Which functions are linked to confirmations?
4. Which confirmation procedures are available?
5. What data can be entered during confirmations?
6. What is a milestone confirmation?
7. What is an unplanned milestone?
8. What identifies a progress confirmation?
9. What role does the control key defined in the operation play during confirmation?
10. Is it possible to link a confirmation with a goods movement posting?
11. What is a goods receipt?
12. What are the effects of a goods receipt posting?
13. What is the relevancy of the “delivery completed” indicator?
14. What is the function of overdelivery/underdelivery tolerance in the material master play?
15. Order Settlement / Archiving and Deleting
16. What is meant by order settlement?
17. What causes a production order to be debited/credited?
18. What is the difference between prelimenary costing and actual costing?
19. Which are the usual steps during order settlement?
20. What means variance calculation?
21. How is an order settled if the header material is a standard price material?
22. At which points in time can an order be settled?
23. Which conditions must be fulfilled before an order can be archived?
24. How are orders archived/deleted?
25. What is meant by “residence times”?

Order Information Systems

1. Which information systems can be used for order management?
2. What are the characteristics of the order information system?
3. What are variable object overviews?
4. What are the special characteristics of a (multi-level) order report?
5. What is the difference between the order information system and the Shop Floor Information System?
6. Which functions are available from the order progress report?

Automation Options

1. What options are available for automating the processing of orders?
2. What role does the production scheduling profile play?
3. Describe the most lean production order and the necessary settings to achieve it?
4. Which functions could be executed in the mass processing?
5. Collective Orders
6. What are the characteristics of collective orders?
7. How can collective orders be created? Which conditions must be fulfilled?
8. What are the advantages of working with collective orders?
9. Which functions can be performed on collective orders?
10. How is scheduling for a complete collective order done?
11. What happens if a date/quantity for an order is changed within the collective order?

Product Cost Planning – General Issues

1. What is a cost element (primary/secondary)?
2. What is a cost component?
3. What is a cost component split?
4. Explain the Costing Variant and the main settings in customizing.
5. What is a costing type?
6. What settings can be done in a valuation variant?
7. How is a costing sheet structured?

Base unit costing

1. Describe base unit costing
2. Which master data are required for base unit costing?
3. How can results of BUC be used in further calculations?

Cost estimation without quatity structure

1. What is meant by quantity structure?
2. Describe costing w/o quantity structure
3. Which master data are required for that costing logic?

Cost estimation with quantity structure

1. Describe cost estimation with quatity structure
2. How can the quantity structure be determined?
3. What is activity based costing?
4. How could results from standard cost estimation be updated into the material master?
5. What happens if stock is on hand during that price update?

Repetitive Manufacturing – General Issues

1. What are the differences between discrete manufacturing and repetitive manufacturing?
2. What are the characteristics of make-to-stock repetitive manufacturing and make-to-order repetitive manufacturing?

Master Data for Make-To-Stock Repetitive Manufacturing

1. What master data are necessary in repetitive manufacturing (material master, bill of material, production line, routing)?
2. Describe the the following material master data:

• Repetitive manufacturing indicator?
• Repetitive manufacturing profile?
• Production versions?

1. Which object is used to collect the material costs and production activities?
2. What are the various options available for establishing a link between the cost collector and the production version of a material? What role doe the repetitive manufacturing profile play here?

Planning Make-To-Stock Repetitive Manufacturing

1. What is the planning table in repetitive manufacturing?
2. What functions can be executed from here?

Material Provision

1. Describe the usage of pull list and stock determination as one of its function.
2. Which other ways are available to make sure that sufficient components are provided to the shop floor?

Backflush

1. What does backflush mean in a repetitive manufacturing context?
2. Explain the functions of final backflush.
3. How can production activities be entered in the system?
4. What is meant by post processing list?
5. What are the advantages and disadvantages of negative stock?
6. What does the reporting point backflush procedure entail?

Evaluations

1. Which evaluations are available?
2. What is a reporting point overview?

Logistics Information System – Data Warehouse

1. What is the concept behind the Data Warehouse?
2. Which individual information systems does the SAP Logistics Information System comprise?
3. What data are evaluated by the information systems?
4. What are info structures? What are the characteristics of info structures?
5. Is there any relationship between system transaction data and the data in the info structures?
6. Which reporting options are available in the SAP Information System?
7. What is the difference between evaluations in LIS and evaluations on system transaction data in the PP component?

Standard Analyses

1. What are standard analyses?
2. Which navigation options are available in standard analyses?
3. Which options in standard analyses can be used to influence the way in which data is presented?
4. Which analysis functions are available in standard analyses (ABC analysis, comparisons, classification, etc.)?

Early Warning System

1. What is an “early warning system”?
2. What are the various applications for the early warning system?
3. How can the early warning system be used in standard analyses?
4. What is an exception analysis?
5. Which options are available for defining that an analysis should be performed at regular intervals?
6. Which types of analysis are available in the early warning system (threshold value analysis, trend analysis, planned/actual comparison)?

Flexible Analyses

1. What are flexible analyses? What is the difference between flexible analyses and standard analyses?
2. What are evaluation structures? What are evaluations?