Our buyers have been seeing this behavior and are perplexed by it.
MRP creates a new PO Suggestion for a part with a due date in the future.
Time Phase shows earlier date for the demand.
Buyers create the PO with the due date listed on the suggestion.
MRP runs and then tells the buyer to expedite to the earlier date.
Why wouldn’t the new PO Suggestion tell the buyer the actual demand date, and not the date based on the part lead time? Does anyone else have this issue? If yes, how do you deal with it?
Look at the material you are purchasing. Is there lead time? Calculate when it would arrive and that should be the date of the suggestion from the original MRP or PO Suggestions.
The demand for the material on the job could be earlier because of someone firmed up the job and scheduled it for an earlier date after MRP or PO Suggestions was run the first time (which created this PO suggestion). It could also be due to someone checking the checkbox to ignore constrained material in MRP or Quick Jobs. Because of that, the job gets planned for an earlier date. There are other reasons this could be happening as well but these are two of the more common reasons.
Once the buyer creates the PO with the due date that is “suggested”, when MRP or PO Suggestions is kicked off, a suggestion to expedite will be created because the demand for the material is sooner than when it is expected to arrive according to the PO. You could “lock” the date on the PO Release and it should stop that suggestion.
Thanks for the response. I understand how the current system works, I’m wondering why it works this way. It seems to us that it make more sense to place the order and ask the supplier to ship on the date that matches the demand. The current method requires at least a second contact with the supplier after the next MRP run to ask them to change the requested date on the PO we placed one day ago! The system knows the actual required date, so why does it give the buyer a different date? Where does this approach make sense?
Rick Stannard
IT Project Manager
Office 860-599-6203
Mobile 860-405-4430
It is a timing issue. More than likely, your buyer is getting a suggestion to purchase material before the job is firmed and scheduled. Many things affect scheduling of a job. There is a guide that explains MRP and how it works which may answer your questions. It’s called the “MRP Technical Reference Guide”. You should be able to find it on Epicweb. It is full of all the algorithms that go into calculating MRP. Your buyer may be purchasing materials the day after MRP runs but the job isn’t firmed and scheduled for days. If the due date for the job (not the required by date) changes for any reason, it can affect purchased materials. Locking dates helps in some cases.