I need some advices from the community. For my parts i need to track two dates, end of life (EOL) and end of support life (EOSL). I understand that there is Hold function to track date and the part get inactive when date is due.
I wondering if I can also make use of tagging a LOT number to a part to achieve similar result like the hold function?
The LOT function seem to allow me to track multiple dates but not sure when one of the date is due, does the system automatically make the part inactive?
Ideally you’d add two UD fields (of type date) to the Part table: EOLDate_c and EOSDate_c
Those would then be accessible in BPM’s or UI customizations.
I don’t think you want to use the Hold system in E10. From what I’ve been told it should be avoided as it is primarily for compatibility with legacy versions (like Vantage 8).
You can use Hold to stop POs and Orders from being generated against that part number.
When a part reaches EOL will you stop selling it / Using it / Buying it?
Could you make a revision called EOL and then use the effective date? Maybe a second revision called EOSL? Then perhaps you could use BPMs to do special things when it finds those revisions to be the current revision.
You can have the part’s Inactive flag set based on one (or both) of the UD fields. But some event needs to happen to trigger the BPM to make the check. Epicor has a process scheduler module that I understand does this. If you don’t have that, their are some other tricks to use other events that happen regularly.
But trying to do it automatically can run into problems. The same conditions that prevent you from changing the Inactive flag in the UI, would also prevent a BPM from changing it. Some examples would be: non-zero QOH, open supply (on open PO’s) or open demand (on open orders), etc…
Have you made a flow chart of how you would do this manually - including all the exceptions (like current QOH, open demand, etc…)? What do you do if there is still QOH when the EOL date comes?