Häufig gestellte Fragen
What is the difference between a planned order and a production order?
A planned order originates in requirements planning (for instance from the MRP run) and is initially only a non-binding planning proposal that estimates the quantity and date of an in-house-produced item. Only through conversion does it become a production order, which is binding, reserves material and can be loaded into the shop floor schedule. In SAP S/4HANA, a fully converted planned order is deleted, while in a partial conversion the remaining quantity persists as a reduced planned order. The production order is thus the executable control object that also supports actual costing, whereas the planned order is merely its planning precursor.
What components does a production order consist of?
A production order is typically structured into header data, a material list and an operation sequence. The header carries the order number, product, order quantity, basic start and basic finish dates and the status; the material list derives the required components from the bill of materials, and the operation sequence takes over the operations with setup, processing and queue times from the routing. In addition, confirmation data is recorded during execution, with actual quantities, yield and scrap quantities as well as times spent. The bill of materials and the routing are the master data foundation from which the specific, scheduled order is generated.
What phases does a production order go through in its lifecycle?
The lifecycle begins with creation and scheduling, in which start and finish dates are calculated per operation — frequently backwards from the delivery date. With release, the order becomes visible on the shop floor, material is reserved and production costs can be posted. During execution, employees or machines confirm quantities and times, often via shop floor data collection or a connected MES. The order is completed by settlement, which compares planned and actual costs and closes the order both technically and commercially.
What is the difference between a production order and a process order?
The production order is the control object of discrete manufacturing, where products are made in countable units and bills of materials and routings form the basis. The process order, by contrast, is used in batch-oriented process manufacturing — typically in the chemical, pharmaceutical or food industries — where quantities arise in volume or weight and recipes or formulas describe the ingredients. In SAP this corresponds to the modules PP for discrete manufacturing and PP-PI for the process industries. Both bundle dates, quantities and costs but differ in their data model and in industry-specific functions such as batch and recipe management.
How are production orders confirmed and post-calculated?
During execution, actual quantities and actual times are confirmed per operation, usually via worker terminals for shop floor data collection or automatically through a connected MES. These confirmations reduce the material stock, increase the stock of the finished product and provide the data basis for the plan/actual comparison. In the subsequent order settlement or post-calculation, the planned standard times and calculated costs are compared with the values actually incurred. This feedback loop shows whether the preliminary costing held up and improves the accuracy of future calculations.
How many production orders typically run at the same time?
The number of parallel production orders depends heavily on the industry, company size, lot-sizing policy and depth of manufacturing and cannot be quantified across the board. In mid-sized companies the range can extend from a handful of larger orders to several hundred open orders, depending on whether production runs in large series or in small, order-specific lots. What matters is less the absolute number than the system's ability to schedule open orders against the available capacities. This is where materials planning and, where applicable, advanced planning and scheduling (APS) provide support in realistically assessing bottlenecks and delivery dates.