PO Suggestions

Epicor version 9.05.701

We have a few parts in our system that are behaving a bit odd in respect of PO Suggestions.

The parts come up as a suggestion as there is a demand, which is fine…but they seem to be picking the wrong supplier.
At first i thought it was because there was 3 approved suppliers against this part, but after removing the 2 invalid ones - it still looks at the wrong supplier.

Can anybody tell me where the supplier field comes from to pick the PO suggestion?
Perhaps its the supplier behind part plant?

Many thanks in advance.

Hi Mark,

We use PO suggestions daily. The supplier comes from the part plant record for the purchasing plant. Also, if urgent planning required, then supplier comes from urgent supplier on part plant.

Nancy

Thanks Nancy, - much appreciated.

What happens if both supplier fields (purchasing supplier AND urgent planning supplier fields are blank in part plant)?

While Parts will show on the PO suggs screen when some data is lacking, in order to utilize PO SUGGS fully, a part requires:

  1. chk-box gen-PO Suggs is checked
  2. BUYER-ID
  3. Supplier…

Strange that you do not have a supplier identified… and arbitrary suppliers are being aligned to the PO requirement.

Thank you.

Just going to add these images too.

The only thing you are missing is the Supplier Price List.
If there is a valid Supplier Price List for this part. When PO Suggestions run, it tries to provide a Suggestion that has the best complete data. From what I have noticed it seems to evaluate the following sources in the following order:

  1. Valid Supplier Price List for Primary Supplier
  2. Valid Supplier Price List for Approved Supplier
  3. Valid Supplier Price List for any Supplier
  4. No PriceList: PO Sugg with just the Primary Supplier.
  5. No Price List: PO Sugg for First Approved Supplier.
    (disclaimer: there is additional logic in here, this is just to help troubleshoot)

Having a valid Price List for a Supplier is the same as being an Approved Supplier.
Sometimes the Buyer forgets to expire Supplier Price Lists. In the past I have deployed a BPM that expires all Price Lists for a Supplier when the Supplier is deleted as an Approved Supplier.

FYI… there is another setting that will override the vendor on PO Suggestions, which may be a new setting in 10. Under Company Configuration / Modules / Production / MRP there is a flag called “Skip Last PO Supplier”. Users have found that the system was not selecting the default vendor or any vendor from the hierarchy as mentioned in above posts. When not checked, the PO Suggestions process uses the last PO vendor (supplier) for the specific part.

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