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RFx events can be very complex and content rich. While building such complex RFx’s, it is very likely for buyers to make mistakes & realize it after events are already published. Therefore it becomes essential for a Strategic Sourcing tool to provide some flexibility for Buyers to make changes to these published RFx’s.

To allow Buyers to make such changes, it is important to build a framework which understands these changes and how these can impact current state of the RFx and stakeholders like Collaborators & Suppliers. Change could be as simple as a spelling mistake change on question’s text or it could be as critical as adding a new line item, changing the semantics of the question or changing a quantity which apparently has a lot of impact on to Suppliers who are currently working on their responses or have already submitted their final responses.  Therefore it is very critical to provide a framework which allows these changes but at the same time should make sure that the integrity between stakeholders is maintained.

In Wave 8 On demand release of SAP Sourcing, we have built this framework in our SAP Sourcing tool to allow buyers to make all necessary changes to RFx’s which are already published to Suppliers.

This framework provides Buyers to make changes to following areas of the RFx’s which are released to Suppliers:-

Line Items :-
Add a New Line Item
Modify existing Line Items Fields - Quantity, Description, Location, Category, Unit Of Measure, Set/Unset Required Flag on Price
Line Item Attachment - Add New Attachments, Modify description of existing Attachments
Set/Unset Visibility Flag - Internal or External
Line Item Setup Fields - Add Line Item specifications, Add Supplier Entered Attributes, Set/Unset Required Flag on both Specifications and Attributes, Set/Unset Visibility Flag on Specifications
Tiered Pricing -  Tiers (Quantity Ranges)

Questions :-
Add a New Questions
Modify existing Questions Such as -
For All Common Fields Across Questions - Question Text, Comment to Suppliers/Collaborators, Description etc.
Yes or No Type – Labels of Yes or No questions
Number or Cost Type – Maximum or Minimum
Quantity Type – Unit of Measure
Multiple Options - Add additional options, Delete exiting options, change labels of existing options,
Set/Unset Flag - Allow the Supplier to select more than one choice.
Set/Unset Questions Required Flag

Event Terms :-
Add New Event Term if it doesn’t exist before.
Modify Existing Event Term - All suppliers would have to accept the terms again before participating in the event
Specifications

Information Sections :- Add new Information

Specification :- Add new Specs, Modify existing Information and Specs

Reordering of different Objects such as Questions, Specs etc.

Below you can find a quick overview on how the Process really works:-

-   Buyer should get special rights in the tool to make changes to RFx which is already published to Suppliers. We call it as “Advance Edit”.   Administrators can set this in the relevant Security profile which is associated with the Buyer user.

-   When Buyer selects Advanced Edit, system warns that the RFx is already Open for Response, Editing may impact suppliers. To let Buyers know the current state of the RFx, system also shows the list of suppliers who have responded or are currently working on their response.  Based on the current active suppliers, system gives 2 options to the buyers, either to make change now or later.

  • Buyer can opt to just send notification to currently active suppliers and allow them to save their responses before making any changes to RFx
  • Buyer can also opt to make changes immediately by forcing currently active suppliers to leave their documents.
  • Buyer can also let suppliers know the exact time at which they would start making the changes to the RFx’s. These messages will be sent as email as well as alert on the supplier UI.

-  After Buyer decides to makes the changes, a new Save & Publish action is available for buyers to publish their changes to the suppliers.

- On Save & Publish, system checks for the currently received Firm responses and provides the list to buyer

  • Buyers can optionally choose to retract the current firm responses based on the changes
  • Buyers can optionally choose to email suppliers for the changes based on the changes

-  All changes made by the Buyer are recorded in detail for audit purposes. Suppliers also see the changes in detail.

As you can see above, how SAP Sourcing provides the robust and transparent framework for buyers to make changes to published RFx at the same time maintains the integrity between the various stakeholders.

I hope you have enjoyed reading this blog. Please feel free to provide your feedback or post your comments and Yes, stay tuned for more blogs on New SAP Sourcing Features 🙂

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