We have all heard the phrase ‘Rob Peter to Pay Paul’ . And it happens quite so often that the part gets issued to assembly or shipped on the sales order when their is a demand for it on a super expensive assembly specially on long lead parts.
So, we tested out the Part Allocation in Fullfilment Workbench and that seems to be lot of work in managing allocations and reallocating is not easy either. Buy-direct comes with its own issues, where the part cannot be issued from stock if the job was setup as buy-direct or make-direct.
Would any of you know a simplified version on how to manage this? I am assuming there got to be an easier way. Any suggestions?
I’ve never had the need to look into it, but I have always wondered what the LoanedQty and BorrowedQty fields in the JobMtl table were for. Maybe try looking into that?
So the scenario is that you have issued a part # to job A and then need it for job B or SO C?
It would seem that Return Material to stock would be the simplest to allow it to be used elsewhere. We don’t have a lot of super long job lead times so forgive me if I have oversimplified this.
I think Brad’s idea is a good one here. We do have long lead and buy to order as well as robbing Peter to pay Paul occasionally. We do not like to use allocations either. If you receive the part to job via buy to job and then return the part to stock when decide to use it for an order or another job, the system allows it. You need to make sure that the job or sales order is setup for the burgled part to pull from inventory. Of course there’s no visibility to this part being up for stealing… but it sounds like your folks know what sitting waiting for work.
Thank you for your responses.
I am not sure how to use the LoanedQty and BorrowedQty, but I will check on that.
I like your idea about return to stock when the part was setup buy-direct on job. That would work if the part is no longer needed on the job.
I think Allocation seems to much more pain than its worth. Also found out that once the part is allocated it cannot be moved. Which is a pain, because when the part passes inspection and moves to Main warehouse, inspection sets PRESTOCK location. Warehouse staff then moves it to its home location. But, if the crossdock is setup, as soon as it hits Main warehouse, it got allocated and got stuck in PRESTOCK location.
Our users liked the idea of hard-allocation and were really hoping it would wwork.
I dont believe that there is any programming (yet?) around the “LoanedQty” and “BorrowedQty” fields. I have never seen anything use these fields. They may be there for future use.
to pull from inventory. Of course there’s no visibility to this part being up for stealing… but it sounds like your folks know what sitting waiting for work.