Replenishment of fixed bins in SAP WM

October 5, 2012October 5, 2012 AroopLeave a comment

The need for replenishment

We buy commodities like rice, atta and sugar in bulk (say in 5-10 kg packs) and store them in
large containers. But in order to use them, we prefer picking from smaller utensils as they are
handy. Yet, when these utensils are empty (or nearly empty), they need to be replenished from
our larger containers.
Businesses also face similar situations, and hence they prefer having separate storage areas for
bulk (say, a godown) and racks (from where they can easily access the desired materials).
SAP WM provides an interesting replenishment technique to transfer materials from a bulk
storage area to a fixed bin.

Prerequisites
In order to automate things, SAP would like to know:
1. The fixed bin where the material is to be replenished
2. The minimum and maximum quantities that can be stored in the fixed bin
3. The minimum quantity that can be replenished (owing to the package size, for instance).
As you would expect, the above information needs to be maintained in the material master WM
views at the warehouse storage type level.

Steps in SAP
Movement type 319 is used in standard for this purpose.

The requirement type is P, which may be done away with (in the movement type configuration)
Run Tcode LP21 for this purpose. The system will propose the quantities to be replenished and
will create TRs. These can then be converted to TOs (manually or automatically)

Calculation of replenishment quantity

The logic of calculating the quantity to be replenished is as follows:
Current stock = Available stock (from LQUA) + Open TR + Putaway stock (from LQUA)
If the Current stock (calculated above) is less than the minimum bin quantity (in article master),
then the quantity to be replenished is calculated as:
Integral multiple of replenishment quantity ( in article master) so that after replenishment, stocks
do not exceed the maximum bin quantity (in article master)
Taking an example:
Current stock: 50 (available stock + open TR + putaway stock)
Min quantity: 500
Max quantity: 1000
Replenishment quantity: 100
Replenishment will take place, since current stock is < Min quantity.
And replenishment must take place in multiples of 100 so that the max quantity (1000) is not
breached
So, 50 + n * 100 < 1000
We have n = 9 and hence 900 would be replenished in our example.

Ensuring availability
By using LP21 as a batch job, it is possible to ensure stocks are available at the point of
consumption, and no expedition is required.