Uniqueness in Serial Number

[Former Member]

Hi All,

I have activated serial number management for Production Order, Goods Issue & Goods Receipt

In system, same serial numbers can be use for many materials for all above scenarios

only uniqueness is Material & serial number combination

for e.g Material X - serial numbers - 100,101,102,103

          Material Y - serial numbers - 100,101,102,103

I need to configure system as, serial number can't be repeated once used for any material

is it standard SAP Behavior, Please suggest

[Former Member]

Hi,

we have opted the following option for the point of warranty issue.

since there are number of characters range could be input as maximum 19 numbers,You could select as year,month and put your number range for each component such as 14010001 to 14019999,You select your range and assign to material in IQ04.next year ,just change the year.

You select your range ,it definitely works,

Devendra

[Former Member]

Hi,

Any updation on the issue?

If u have query, then post otherwise close the thread,

Regards,

Devendra

[Former Member]

Hi Carl

Thanx for Reply, based on clients requirements i need to consider only serial number option & not batches.

for e.g in case of materials with warranty issues. For identifying those materials in future against warranty, i needs to have serial number record of the component.with my present scenario, based on one serial number can't identify specific material.

[carl_korn]

Pushkar --

I can't find any serial number configuration that allows you to set serialization so a serial number is unique to the client (but who knows, there's a lot of configuration that's well-hidden).  I think you're going to need some customization.  There is a customer exit that I believe is specific to the serial number data element (GERNR) -- CONVERSION_EXIT_GERNR_INPUT - that already performs a couple of edits on input serial numbers and can be enhanced to perform additional edits.

I suggest you establish an Equipment Category that is devoted to the products you must warranty (you can use the Customer Equipment category or invent a new one) and apply your custom edits only to that Equipment Category.  The day may come when you need to capture a material/serial number for some other kind of product or asset and you want to "re-use" the serial number.

I believe this exit comes up regardless of what transaction you use to create the material/serial number.  You can verify the serial number hasn't been used and return an error if it already exists.

If you're also looking for functionality that automatically proposes the "next available serial number" then you're going to need even more customization.

What transaction (or transactions) will you be using to define a new serialized item?

Carl

[sjeevan]

Hi,

If you activate the function in IMG to create an equipment number every time a serial number is generated, that number is unique.

You can checkout my reply in the below thread.

You can see the equipment in SerData tab in IQ02, then then use that unique equipment number in IE02 to use it for warranty purposes.

[carl_korn]

Pushkar --

Jeevan makes a good point.  If you create Material/serno ABC 1001 and DEF 1001 you are re-using the serial number 1001, but there will be two equipment masters with different equipment master numbers.  Can you use the unique equipment master number to support your warranty requirements?

Carl

[sjeevan]

Table MASE stores the last used serial number, automatically generated, per material, which means serial numbers are per material.

If you are still wanting to use one number range for the entire materials, you'd have to implement customer exits explained in the following note.

92970 - Technical object: Exits to check or change data

However you need to understand that you need material number in conjunction with serial number to pull up it's data or you need to create your own special ABAP report.

[carl_korn]

Pushkar --

I don't believe you can force SAP to use a serial number only once for all materials without customization.  I believe batch management allows you to make batches unique by material (which you don't want), by plant (which may come close), or by client (which makes a batch number completely unique within your client).

Of course, managing your process using batch numbers instead of serial numbers is certainly a big cultural change.  We have one plant that manages all of their materials using batches (even those to which they apply identification plates with unique serial numbers).

Carl